Oddly enough, I actually can't remember the fire thing, despite all the people who seem to have been more curious about it than anything.Well, it was just a two-half-pages thing (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=809) in the comic itself ...
I'll start. These are not the only ones, but:
I very much wanted to learn more, a lot more, about how the versions of magic work. What can be done, is there a certain set (probably as of yet still unknown to all of the mages, but in principle a limited pool of opportunities) of things that can be accomplished or is it up to the ingenuity of the mage to come up with new things to do.
BTW, I am pretty sure that Lalli and Emil were always supposed to have at the very least a close friendship: she has talked about this a lot, and has mentioned that 'a swede and a finn who become close' were two of the first characters she ever designed.
(Talking about the rune magic in SSSS, I found a Japanese manga called Witch Hat Atelier recently which has a similar magic system and it covers it in a more in depth way. The art is gorgeous too !)
If it's available online, you could suggest it as a Comic of the Month, over on the Worlds and Stories board.
Cinnamon and cardamom and possibly coffee and sugar - what the hey? I am highly skeptical the famed Icelandic greenhouses would be a source for these. Nup.
No idea how much greenhaouse technology is left then but today Iceland does produce bananas. No idea of cinnamon or coffe are possible but sugar beets should be no problem.Sugar beets, definitely. Or maybe they sweeten things with honey. And yes, I think those others can be grown in a greenhouse. Though-- Norway has a seed collection - but they're so Want-to-be-like-the-ancient-vikings. Iceland has managed to get things to grow, but may be too occupied with just farming food and sheep. Denmark may well import tech and seeds, farm and sell sugar, cinnamon and others.
Cinnamon also will grow in the open here. There are several large cinnamon trees and a cassia tree in the Adelaide Botanical Gardens, growing out in the open, also a clove tree, so I see no reason why a greenhouse in Iceland should not successfully grow all of the above - after all their greenhouses are geothermally heated, and here and now they grow good crops of bananas!The problem might be the icelandic winter. It gets really dark then. I think LED production is too tricky for the post apocalyptic society. And long times of uniterrupted darkness could be very tough for a tropical or subtropical plant.
I hoped to see the fact that trolls are to some degree sentient, yet still mercilessly killed, addressed in some way. Does nobody have second thoughts about it?
I think LED production is too tricky for the post apocalyptic society.
Do they need LEDs? I've tried to figure out their technology level, putting aside those things they retain from the pre-Rash world, and I think they could at least make incandescent bulbs. Since grow-lights existed before LEDs, I think they could manage those.They have electric lights, so them having the most primitive variant, incandescent bulbs, is pretty much a given. (Which is not to say that making working IBs is trivial.)
IIRC, for us, "grow lights" became a thing in the form of fluorescent tubes, not earlier.People made sort of light bulb based grow lights. But needed some not standard glas for trying to get some not infrared light out of these bulbs. Was very very ineffective.
Iceland has loads of energy due to their nature, and having abandoned much of our modern tech it should be well available for growing of plants. But only such plants they had already, because getting them from somewhere else would be prohibitively dangerous.
They might have gotten seeds from the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, though.Word of God is that the post-Rash people have not yet seen a reason to pop it open, though.
I’m inclined to think the same as Tehta, I don’t think Minna has decided what the Rash really is in full detail.Same for the amazingly-advanced batteries, other aspects of the technology used, the possibility of survivors elsewhere, yadda yadda. Minna is not the kind of author to do extensive worldbuilding beyond the aspects that she plans to eventually show in canon, anyway. (Which is why I'm hard pressed to nominate anything in this thread; most of what I would like to see in more detail was already bound to remain shrouded in mystery before Minnas interests shifted away from SSSS.)
Same for the amazingly-advanced batteries, other aspects of the technology used, the possibility of survivors elsewhere, yadda yadda. Minna is not the kind of author to do extensive worldbuilding beyond the aspects that she plans to eventually show in canon, anyway.
Sigrun had the most unexplored potential - her upbringing must have included so much danger and violence, and yet her character development started sliding in Adv. 1 already. Her last piece of genuine development was her angst when she was ill. I don't really get a charge out of her supposed drifting toward a hookup with Mikkel, which I guess was the whole point of her even being on Adv. 2. She was introduced as a zesty character with a taste for Bold Adventure, but she & Mikkel have skipped straight to the companionable cuppa together stage. She had more frisson with Reynir playing Rock, Paper, Scissors, Sheep, Gun. Bah.
One of the things that first caught my attention in this comic was a strong female character, wearing sensible clothes. Two of them, in fact! Then one died. Okay, fine - it's the creator's choice blah blah... but now we're down to one strong female character, who proceeds to fall to pieces and have to be propped up by a male character. Ooookay... she's had a traumatic experience, and she's fighting an infection, that makes sense. She'll go back to normal once she's better, right? Nope. She starts acting all lovely-dovey towards Mikkel. Now don't get me wrong, that's fine, but their whole dynamic changed - the entire team did. Again, I can chalk it up to the new situation but it really, really started to feel like Mum and Dad on a little road trip with the kids.
Oh wow, I haven't even thought about Sigrun turning into a loving semi-passive girlfriend (I have been thinking of Sigrun/Mikkel as about as canonical as Emil/Lalli, sooo...) but now I am becoming semi-annoyed about it too.
I can sort of see it both ways. I see that Sigrun makes more of the 'combat' decisions, and Mikkel -- the bigger-picture strategic decisions. Which makes sense, given their skill-sets, but it gives me the feeling that a lot of the adventure is the Onni-and-Mikkel show. Also, she does claim to be confused as to why they are even following Lalli, at first (even as she goes along with it). Of course, she might not be that serious about her question.
Have you ever read his long poem ‘Paul’s Wife’? It is an utter delight
Yeah, so, I would have wiSSSShed to get some closure by learning what Lalli and Onni speak with their dead relatives before they have to go. But maybe we are being weaned off the characters? Certainly not the way to support the readers about the momentous end of the Hotakainen arc.Quite frankly, if an author who discovered religion recently and aims to wrap up the previous storyline ASAP were to suddenly extoll in it at length how a Finnish family like her own breaks up "properly", it'd have me worried ...
Grey, I think Minna has given us enough of the background that between us we can carry the tale on in all manner of interesting directions. Happens sometimes also with folktales - consider how the American poet Robert Frost played with the developing canon of Paul Bunyan folklore. He took things barely hinted at in, or omitted from, the existing tales and played with them. Have you ever read his long poem ‘Paul’s Wife’? It is an utter delight, and has something of the same feel as those British tales of how the fisherman or lighthouse keeper came to marry the mermaid or the selchie. Being a lumberjack but nevertheless a decent man, of course he would marry a tree spirit or dryad or whatever kind of weird she is.Róisín, I fully agree. We have a nice ground here to plant our seeds. :) And in some way it's better to have room to create than a fixed (and closed) canon. And thanks for the suggestion. I haven't read that poem but I'll try to, as soon as possible. :)
unless Lalli does some magic trick right at the end, all we see of his powers outside the dreamworld is the ability to detect the infected... :(
Well, that and detecting lime-green umbrellas.
I went looking for some information and got reminded about a lot of scenes which I will hate to remain unexplained. For example,
What were the skulls in the scary reedy place where Reynir and Lalli ended up in when looking for Onni via dreamspace? What were the figures in the fog there? Why was the place dangerous, and why they followed Onni's... trace?? into that place? Why Reynir couldn't find Onni?
I have always been curious about what exactly Lalli had gone off to do in Site 24 before he so abruptly defenestrated and was caught by Mikkel. Questions to which we may never know the answers!At the risk of prompting great pain, I'd say that the chances of getting that answered have long gone out the window.
At the risk of prompting great pain, I'd say that the chances of getting that answered have long gone out the window.
...which in turn leads me to wonder about the practice of playing music in the Known World, and whether this practice as old as humanity itself was threatened by the impetus to stay quiet. I mean, no flutes? no trumpets?We know they have kantele at least. They can very well sing of their history as they know it. Another instruments like a willow flute -- I suppose people can make those. Otherwise, I don't think anyone has much time making instruments, they're too busy farming and other things they need to survive.
No drumkits upon which to go 'ba-dum-tssssh'
?
...which in turn leads me to wonder about the practice of playing music in the Known World, and whether this practice as old as humanity itself was threatened by the impetus to stay quiet. I mean, no flutes? no trumpets?
No drumkits upon which to go 'ba-dum-tssssh'
?
If you have protected settlements, you could do loud things there. Like music or parenting (kids are very loud).... soundproofed underground day care centers ... ? >:D
Another instruments like a willow flute -- I suppose people can make those. Otherwise, I don't think anyone has much time making instruments, they're too busy farming and other things they need to survive.
So well hidden that even Minna thinks they're not there.
Oh yes, the Sami are definitely missing. My headcanon is that their survivors are making sure the Finns and Scandinavians don’t know about them. Based on history, a reasonable plan.
Edit: also many styles of magic need music to work.
-- Jitter, I like that headcanon about the Sami! So well hidden that even Minna thinks they're not there. Maybe their numbers are coming up and they're thinking about coming out of hiding by around year 100, though?
Ahha! That's smart. Either way, there's no way they're gone or that the other explanation Minna gave is true.To bring everyone to the same page, after effectively declaring the Sami language extinct in the post-Rash world per the Language Trees (http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=196), Minna presented the in-story explanation that the Sami people have joined the settlements of non-Sami survivors and mixed into the general population there.
Spoiler: an *actual* spoiler today • show
To bring everyone to the same page, after effectively declaring the Sami language extinct in the post-Rash world per the Language Trees (http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=196), Minna presented the in-story explanation that the Sami people have joined the settlements of non-Sami survivors and mixed into the general population there.
To bring everyone to the same page, after effectively declaring the Sami language extinct in the post-Rash world per the Language Trees (http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=196), Minna presented the in-story explanation that the Sami people have joined the settlements of non-Sami survivors and mixed into the general population there.
Spoiler: a lil controversial maybe • show
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even the power of the post rash superpower (iceland) is that little, that the other survivor cultures felt no need to adapt. Or everyone would speak icelandic and the gods of the fins would not be a thing.Weeeeell, Icelandic is said to be the lingua franca of everyone in the Known World doing "academic" work, and there's a bonus comic showing that even Finland uses genuine (ancient) Icelandic coin (https://sssscomic.fandom.com/wiki/Currency#Post-Rash_Currency). But I guess that we weren't talking about Reykjavík orchestrating such activity in the first place; those living off the same local resources are much more likely to go "we don't have X to waste on that" ...
or else someone physically went from one group to the other.In that context, it's interesting that most of those prologue people who did become survivors are shown to have left their usual dwellings to achieve that, taking their (rather unadapted for the new surroundings) culture with them.
she had also believed my branch to be extinct. We weren’t extinct, just in Australia.How's that for a genuinely Australian motto ... ;D
lwise, I like that idea. Because even in the modern real world, with modern communications, it is possible for groups of people of minority races, language groups, religious faiths or cultures to become scattered across the world, never mind just within a single continent, and to lose track of one another completely. I speak from experience, having been for much of my life involved in efforts to help such groups to find one another again.
Kind of the opposite of what was missing from SSSS, but could have done without. I think the 60-page prologue was largely unnecessary, it was kind of neat to see the modern-day ancestors of the main cast and how the world fell apart and the environmental storytelling at the end was cool but... It had little to no relevance with the rest of the comic.
JoB, Sigrun definitely talks about having worked with scouts before (and her 'how's life for you' reaction to meeting Lalli suggests they weren't Finnish ones), and the Swedish Cleanser poster mentions (Swedish) scouts. So it seems to be an internationally known job.I afraid that Sigrun said that she's new to Finnish MAGES (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=182). :3
Kind of the opposite of what was missing from SSSS, but could have done without. I think the 60-page prologue was largely unnecessary, it was kind of neat to see the modern-day ancestors of the main cast and how the world fell apart and the environmental storytelling at the end was cool but... It had little to no relevance with the rest of the comic.
But yes, even if the concept of 'scout' exists everywhere (maybe apart from Iceland) it's unclear how far afield they are supposed to explore. (Although, even in Sweden... I know it's not mentioned on the poster, but, logically speaking, wouldn't some amount of scouting be helpful BEFORE the Cleansing begins? To identify promising directions, dangers, etc? The Cleansers absolutely do not seem like the type of people capable of doing this for themselves. And the boundaries of what is immediately useful to explore would move every year, wouldn't they? So maybe Swedish scouts have more immediate reason to explore than Finnish ones, given the amount of cleansing they do.)
And, yes, as you say, her working with Finns before seems unlikely. I suppose working with Swedish cleansers (and their scouts) would be possible, since there is no language barrier, and we know from Emil that Norwegians do this from time to time, seemingly for fun.... yeah, doing a fun thing would be right up Sigruns alley, I guess ...
I know it's not mentioned on the poster, but, logically speaking, wouldn't some amount of scouting be helpful BEFORE the Cleansing begins? To identify promising directions, dangers, etc?Hmmm. The impression I'm getting from "phase 1" is that they blanket the entire area with a huge fire, and wait at the perimeter for anything that tries to get out. I suppose that it would be helpful to know what might be coming at them, but where it hid before is pretty much irrelevant - and the cleansers do strike me as candidates for a "whatever shows up, we can handle it (and if not, there's no insurance to explain any details to, anyway, so we ignore that)" attitude ...
That said: based, again, on my "reading" of that is going on in the comic (in full awareness that I have no proof), the way Lalli immediately slips into a routine of 'memorize a map, go into unknown territory, observe, report your findings' suggests to me that this is something he is very used to doing.... I tend to agree. In theory, it would be possible that the people in Keuruu sent Lalli into areas without telling him what they already knew about them, the mirror image of his infamous "kyllä" report to them, if you will, but what the %*#!! would they have everything on file if that's the kind of disuse they make of it ...
Though it's possible that scouts from either side sometimes find dead campfires at the extremes of their ranges, and wonder who else might be out there.Or the occasional wandering reindeer with tack or other accoutrements (https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-26244339) ... ;D
I'm curious, how did this process work? It sounds like some great work, and it really stands out to me for some reason.
But Iceland? What would the team do in Iceland?
Kevin_Redcrow, I agree with you that the ships would not have sailed in canon even if there were many more adventures. It’s not a theme in this comic (except lately with Sigrun and Mikkel, which frankly is a tad bluntly carried).
I am under the impression that travel to outside of the Nordics was out of the question long before the abandonment of further adventures. Minna wanted to make a comic about a Nordic apocalypse. Of course if she had kept going for decades and very many adventures, the world may have grown. But the handful of adventures she had ideas for were all to be set here.
Looking at the map of the Known World, there's an awful lot of land north of any known settlement in Norway, Sweden, or Finland. It doesn't seem to me that scouts would go up there since there is no possibility of Cleansing those areas for generations. The Sami could be roaming all over up there with their herds, avoiding any Y0 cities, and never encounter anyone from the Known World.
Though it's possible that scouts from either side sometimes find dead campfires at the extremes of their ranges, and wonder who else might be out there.
I wonder what the plan was for the next three adventures.
<snip>But Iceland? What would the team do in Iceland?
I kinda thought that those extras showing the team on vacation together strongly implied the Sigrun/Mikkel ship.
But Iceland? What would the team do in Iceland?
Start up a greenhouse business with citrus that does not suffer from suicidal tendencies. :mikkel:I guess that the Icelanders would rather want some expert (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=797) advice on how to pick up the snail's pace of their reforestation efforts (https://www.geographyrealm.com/icelands-long-road-to-reforestation/). :onni:
I guess that the Icelanders would rather want some expert (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=797) advice on how to pick up the snail's pace of their reforestation efforts (https://www.geographyrealm.com/icelands-long-road-to-reforestation/). :onni:
The images I've seen of Finland, Norway, and Sweden show forests of trees with very slim trunks; they seem to be no larger than 1/2 Meter in diameter.At least to some extent, comparatively thin trunks with almost no branches or foliage are a telltale sign of that tree having grown within a well-established forest - where newcomers have to grow tall fast to secure the sunlit patch of the treetops stratum that their fallen predecessor opened up. Note how many of the trees that us humans find "notable" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_individual_trees) - including, but not restricted to, those famed for their girth or top-to-bottom foliage - happen to be isolated ones ...
I relate to this so much. Every time I try to recommend the comic to anyone, I fear that the prologue will scare them off. But I kinda like to re-read it with the whole comic, because it feels a bit nostalgic (i think?)
At least to some extent, comparatively thin trunks with almost no branches or foliage are a telltale sign of that tree having grown within a well-established forest - where newcomers have to grow tall fast to secure the sunlit patch of the treetops stratum that their fallen predecessor opened up. Note how many of the trees that us humans find "notable" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_individual_trees) - including, but not restricted to, those famed for their girth or top-to-bottom foliage - happen to be isolated ones ...
I thought the thin trunks had to do with harvesting of trees for lumber. The lumber industry tends cut down conifers when they reach an optimal point for wood quality and maximum yield within a particular time frameAh, sorry, I thought you were talking about the trunks being thin considering the tree's height/age. Yes, the industry fells trees at ages 30 to 160 (https://www.wald-prinz.de/umtriebszeit-wie-lange-benotigt-ein-baum-bis-zur-hiebsreife/3697) (depending on species), even though the natural lifespans can reach four digits with some.
Coming back to this part of the discussion: I liked the prologue; and I thought it was very useful in setting up the background of the story.
According to Google, Iceland has seven libraries just in Reykjavik, not to mention book stores.Ah, i remember the times when we tried to guess where the team should go next to hit the mother lode (https://sssscomic.fandom.com/wiki/Copenhagen#The_Royal_Library) ... ::)
My personal answer for both of these questions is that a deliberate effort was made to wipe out the old, technological civilization.That's essentially a given, considering that this info page (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=67) puts the Icelanders' stance as
the Icelanders have kept the technology of the old world alive, while rejecting all of the history tied to it. They were spared from the great illness by their ancient Gods, whom they now put their faith into.(Yes, it says that they "kept the technology alive", but lack of the global resources that we use for it will nonetheless have made a cull in that area, too.)
Okay, for the Icelanders, but what about the Danes and Swedes? What happened to their books?
A second question is, how could Christianity have been so completely forgotten that Reynir doesn't even know about it? I brought this up in the comments once upon a time, and was accused of being unwilling to accept that my favorite superstition had been forgotten. No, I'm not a believer, but I'm certainly aware of the existence of Christianity, its beliefs in a general sense, and the appearance of its churches. It's been a influence on Western culture, including in Iceland for a thousand years according to Onni. Reynir's great-grandparents would have known all about it. Reynir should know something about it, but he doesn't.
My personal answer for both of these questions is that a deliberate effort was made to wipe out the old, technological civilization. Maybe there was a belief that the Rash was intentionally created and spread, by technology or by Christians or both, or maybe there was just a sense that society had utterly failed and people struck out in desperation and anger against the things they could reach. But those questions aren't addressed in the comic, and I suppose never will be nowThis also.
When you are running away as the early panels show in adventure 1, books are probably the last thing you will take. They are heavy and take up a lot of space.
I remember that in your fic at least one of the towns on Bornholm has a library, was it Ronne?) and I presume that individuals or households might have books in year 0 much as they do now? Bornholm was one of the places that didn’t go back to the old gods and stuck with science, I think? Because Danes?
I know my own home library would be an absolute treasure trove to post-apoc survivors, with books on everything from building houses from scratch to edible wild plants and first aid.
True, but the people on Bornholm did not run away. The books there should be intact, unless they were intentionally destroyed.
I figure Iceland has printing presses; maybe Denmark and Sweden do tooDunno about presses, but Torbjörn the Hireling was in the book reproduction business (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=137) - and had his epiphany of how much more valuable "originals" are there.
Dunno about presses, but Torbjörn the Hireling was in the book reproduction business (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=137) - and had his epiphany of how much more valuable "originals" are there.
Well, that is one of the points that bothered me. Building a press would be far more efficient (and more accurate) than paying a bunch of people to retype books, like a bunch of medieval monks hand-writing illuminated manuscripts. I have to figure what was happening with Torbjörn is that he was transcribing a delicate book so that those ruffians at the printers would have papers that they could handle with their clumsy, inky hands instead of the precious original manuscript.FWIW, with the number of copies that the Known World likely needs made of most original books, typesetting (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typesetting) may well prove uneconomic due to its fixed costs. Back when I was in school, before photocopiers became affordable, the teachers distributed sheets they made with a spirit duplicator (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_duplicator) - and yes, as long as we're talking walls of text, the master sheets were made with a typewriter. (Of course, the math, geography, etc. teachers would add small hand-drawn illustrations as well.)
FWIW, with the number of copies that the Known World likely needs made of most original books, typesetting (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typesetting) may well prove uneconomic due to its fixed costs. Back when I was in school, before photocopiers became affordable, the teachers distributed sheets they made with a spirit duplicator (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_duplicator) - and yes, as long as we're talking walls of text, the master sheets were made with a typewriter. (Of course, the math, geography, etc. teachers would add small hand-drawn illustrations as well.)
(And then, when the school bought its first photocopier, the fuser (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photocopier#How_it_works_(using_xerography)) occasionally failed. Then we'd get exercise sheets where the toner was barely held on by electrostatic attraction, and when you handled it roughly, blew or sneezed on it or somesuch, you'd have a blank sheet of paper instead of instructions for your class- or homework. Fun times. ::) )
Depending on the book, of course, you might not need many copies, as you said. On the other hand, it might be worthwhile to mass-produce schoolbooks and scientific texts.Agree on schoolbooks, not so sure about "scientific texts". Even in our time, print runs of outright scientific publications are so small as to make some of the journals prohibitively expensive even to university libraries (which leads to "publications" that, ironically, aren't really "public", and scientists working with stacks of photocopies from whenever they got the chance of making some, to the detriment of lists of references in later publications based on them; and, further down the chain of causality, online "preprint" services to cut out the middleman with the printing press ...)
They do have newspapers, so some way of printing is in useIn our history, the first forms of the printing press were woodblock printing (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodblock_printing) and movable type (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Movable_type), both fraught with high fixed cost of producing (and, to an extent, storing) the master. (Sidenote: I'm rather surprised to see that hot metal typesetting (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_metal_typesetting) was that late.) I'd guess that the Known World, having the info about ancient technology at hand, would rather start doing the larger priint runs with offset (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offset_printing) technology; apart from the phototypesetting and computer typesetting variants of producing the plate, which can be replaced by somewhat time-consuming manual work IMHO, it's still not rocket technology.
Agree on schoolbooks, not so sure about "scientific texts".
Back when I was in school, before photocopiers became affordable, the teachers distributed sheets they made with a spirit duplicator (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirit_duplicator)
I do wish that the fire that was seen in one of Emil's dreams would be explained. Was a village being burnt down? Was the forest on fire? Was it in Östersund, from where I believe Emil came from? This is the only thing I feel is somewhat missing.
My personal theory is that that's the factory (I seem to remember someone calling it that) Emil's parents owned, and so when it burned down they hit rock bottom. Thus Emil dropped out of school, joined the cleansers, etc etc.
I think the order is slightly different. It burned, they hit rock bottom, Emil couldn't have his useless tutors anymore and therefore went to school for two years, then he joined the Cleansers for two years before joining the expedition. So he didn't drop out of school because they hit rock bottom; instead, he went to school because they hit rock bottom.
I think more burned than just the factory (if it was the factory.) Doesn't Emil say something to Lalli, when Lalli first comes into his dream, about 'don't worry, the fire never gets this far in the dream' -- thereby implying that in real life it did get to Emil's house?
found it!
http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=810
and the actual line's even clearer:
"this dream always ends long before the fire spreads here".
Minna answered some questions about Emil's parents during a livestream this year. The details are here (https://ssssforum.com/index.php?topic=1286.msg188131#msg188131), but the overall gist was that she had not decided on the details, but his mother died when he was little and his dad is still alive. (That's also when she added the bit about the mom being the one setting the fire.)
Minna answered some questions about Emil's parents during a livestream this year. The details are here (https://ssssforum.com/index.php?topic=1286.msg188131#msg188131), but the overall gist was that she had not decided on the details, but his mother died when he was little and his dad is still alive. (That's also when she added the bit about the mom being the one setting the fire.)
Thanks.
So the fire would have been also when he was little. That doesn't match very well with only two years of school afterwards before he became a Cleanser, does it? especially with only two years as cleanser before he joins the expedition as an adult. Maybe Minna doesn't mean the same thing by "really young" in the context of a parent dying that I would; but it also reads as if she was just making up things on the fly in that chat without thinking about whether they actually fit with anything shown earlier.
In addition, if they'd become poor when he was a small child, then he'd have grown up being poor; it wouldn't have come as a shock to him, and he'd have learned the habits mostly of poor people, not of rich ones (though his parents might have kept some of the habits of rich people, which might still have affected him. But his mother's habits couldn't have continued to affect him if she was already dead --)
Minna was definitely making it up on the fly that it was the mum who started the fire. I’m really not going to consider it canon, she was joking about it first and then the scenario got so weird that she laughingly said “you know what, I’m going to call this canon”.... what, was she imagining Molotov Mum dousing herself with gasoline and YOLOing through the entire Flammable Preciouses Storage on her way out? :?
... what, was she imagining Molotov Mum dousing herself with gasoline and YOLOing through the entire Flammable Preciouses Storage on her way out? :?
I also was thinking that asking Minna anything seems risky, if she's just going to throw out things off the top of her head without thinking whether they make any sense.
This case actually put me off asking some of my questions. I would love to know what she had or has had properly planned (she has said she has forgotten some), but I don’t want her to just whip up something because of being asked, and then call it canon.Yeah, sure, seconded. We do not want to prompt the author to turn into a loose canon. 8)
One of the more interesting point in the entire mum / great fire discussion was that Minna mentioned that “the research facility” was burned. What research facility? Did we know of this?? Hmmm? Hmmmmmmm?... hm. Nope, not that I remember; the only "research facility" we've seen in the comic proper was Sivs workplace, supposedly near Mora, while Emil was born and grew up in Östersund.
Do we know that there were other residential buildings there, besides Emil's family's house? Maybe they had founded or funded the facility, and either donated some of their land, or wanted it close because one or more of them worked there.No, we have just the info from the three dream scenes, and only this one panel (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=809) and a half (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=810) showing the outside. It's definitely not downtown, but on the other hand, if the facility came later, why would Emils family, officially living "in Östersund", have a house away from the rest of the settlement? Sure, it would be possible that the generation building it were a tad off the hermit side, but.
If I understand correctly, our-world staves last different lengths of time depending on the medium on which they are formed, the nature of the staves, the intent and the words or song, if any, accompanying the staves. I had been presuming the same about Minnaverse staves.At the very least, Sigruns suggestion (http://www.sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=546) would promise to shorten their lifetime, too ...
They can’t be permanent or permanent until disintegration of the medium, or they would be absolutely everywhere by Y90.Certainly not for lack of trying (http://sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=27).
JoB that’s exactly it! They may have a lot of sheep, but not so many that she would have to spend her life drawing the sheep husbandry staves, if they were permanent. In that case they would also be painted into the post before building the fence, when the mage could work at a workbench rather than kneeling on uneven rocky ground.Also, the reason they're not permanent cannot simply be bad choice of material, because then we'd see them getting carved into the posts before the fence is erected. So, whatever the details are, it's something with the magic involved that limits their lifetime.
At the very least the Icelandic ships [...] would be covered in them.Hm. Who says they're not - just on the inside of the hull, where they (and those repainting them when necessary) enjoy a longer life?
And I find it hard to believe that even the Swedes and Danes would remain skeptical if there were items that clearly have lasting effect.I guess that raises the question whether the seiður hand magic-warded items to others, or make them only for their own folks' use (which would be greatly "helped" by a short lifespan of the effect). It's simple to disbelieve in stuff you never get to see working in person ...
Although, maybe the immunity test is magica?
Although 'essence of troll' is also an awesome idea. Collecting it would be quite an interesting job!Maybe rodent beasts of small things. Easy to trap easy to kill. Plus it helps prevent invasion where people live
(Incidentally, the Icelandic rune could easily require 'essence of troll' as its writing medium. Many of the runes get very specific about such ingredients!)
I think Finnish magic is maybe a bit underdeveloped while Icelandic magic is definitely underdeveloped.
I think not knowing to much about it in part 1 was fine and actually benefited the story but in part 2 it become a bit of a problem. Having a better idea of what Reynir learned in mage school would of helped but most of it is that we have almost no idea what a military-trained Icelandic mages knows.
That said, I can't think of any way to give readers infomotion on this without derealing the plot. An Info Page could have been given but that may have just been distracting for the audience.
One other thing: magic has a cost of some sort. Minna did actually confirm that this holds for Icelandic as well as Finnish magic. We don't know how this works, but it would imply a limit on how many functioning runes an Iceladic mage can produce. Perhaps a more permanent rune might have a higher cost? Or perhaps a mage can be responsible for only so many active runes at once, and has to choose which ones to maintain?
Just dumb ideas, here.
Also, as Roisin said, we do know from books on the runes that in many cases just having a drawn rune doesn't produce the desired effect: one also has to use a spell, which can have a limited duration. I am not sure whether a rune can be reused for many spells, but I find it amusing to imagine that Iceland has 'public runes' that can be used by any mage to cast their spells. Even runes of 'finding your way' carved on rocks in places where people get lost a lot, that sort of thing.
I really wish we could have seen an experienced seidr mage. Either Reynir properly trained or maybe meeting one in Norway.I would surmise that the teacher (http://sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=53) looks like she has tons of experience, just not in what you meant to see expertise in ... :3
So Reynir I think got a *ton* of support on magic use in adventure 1 because the gods really wanted those ghosts released.Hmmm ... the problem I see with that is that those ghosts were a specifically Danish thing apparently, and neither pre- nor post-Rash Danes are shown as being particularly close to the old gods. Sure, eventually those ghosts might've become a threat to the rest of the Known World, but.
I am curious how mages work in Iceland that he was never spotted.I do not remember any part of SSSS saying that the Icelanders would be specifically scanning for domestic talents. The info page (http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=87) says that "anyone who is discovered to have magical powers" (emphasis mine) is suitable to receive training. Add to that that Reynirs parents do their darndest to keep him at home while trained mages might well get sent to missions elsewhere, possibly even outside Iceland ...
Dreki, especially considering that the area where the final confrontation happened was at Koli, which used to be consistent a place of power. Onni should have been powerful there. Simply having him say aloud that “the power here is corrupted” would have helped a lot.I wonder whether lots and lots of grosslings having sat in the hotel for 90 years, apparently completely unfazed by said power just around the corner, might convey that exact same message ... ?
There was the scene when the team was leaving the sentinel mage’s area and both Lalli and Reynir felt a powerful shivering, maybe that was intended to lead to some “foul area” thing. Also how the Dream World felt bad to Reynir, wen they went looking for Onni while still in Iceland. And the skulls in the water there (one of my favorite panels btw).
She didn’t use the ancient faith because of having been a believer in it (she was atheist before) but it’s possible she didn’t feel comfortable portraying “witchcraft” anymore, and therefore went for a “battle in dreamscape” rather than showing spells. A great loss for us.
I would also have loved to see an experienced or even mid-level Icelandic mage, preferably of the Norwegian army persuasion. There is one illustration in which Reynir is “holding” a galdastafur of light in the air between his hands as if about to throw it outward. I want to think he will learn to do that!
I would surmise that the teacher (http://sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=53) looks like she has tons of experience, just not in what you meant to see expertise in ... :3
Hmmm ... the problem I see with that is that those ghosts were a specifically Danish thing apparently, and neither pre- nor post-Rash Danes are shown as being particularly close to the old gods. Sure, eventually those ghosts might've become a threat to the rest of the Known World, but.
I do not remember any part of SSSS saying that the Icelanders would be specifically scanning for domestic talents. The info page (http://sssscomic.com/comic.php?page=87) says that "anyone who is discovered to have magical powers" (emphasis mine) is suitable to receive training.
She isn't shown drawing a single rune in comic time. She doesn't actually show anything to us about how magic works and Reynir comes away from her class with no visible increase in skills. So we don't *see* a mage with expertise in the "show don't tell" sense.Precisely. She has lots of experience in teaching magic. In the "those who can't do it, teach it" sense ...
Anne was divinely gifted the ability to hold her sense of self for 90 years until help could be provided to save the lost souls. Despite having turned into a troll.I'm not sure we're working from the same page here - according to Minnas statements, SSSS magic is a gift from the old (pre-Christian) gods, who abstain from interfering with humans who belong to another pantheon (mainly the old Finnish gods', who reciprocrate). She even explained that the few Danes who do have a magic talent got it as a gift from the Nordic gods, not to mention all of the Danes being equipped with a fylgja, a rather Nordic-specific piece of equipment, in spite of their disbelief in it. And Christianity dropped out of the post-Rash world to the point of Onni barely knowing it existed until they ran into Anne.
Like I don't know what other evidence is needed.
I can imagine it's possible that the christian god stomped their feet at first and refused to work with a heathen [...]
And honestly there's no reason in comic to believe that the gods are cranky about what the humans in an area believe or working together.
Yes so how is someone discovered?To me, first and foremost, "discovery" is not what you call the expected results of a systematic screening. You discover a bug in the software you've already shipped to X customers, but you don't "discover" a completely unresponsive device in the course of doing proper QA on the hardware. Also, that info page says that those discovered "may enter a training program" - having the entire populace searched for those with potential doesn't sound like there'd be much "may" left in their future, even if only by peer pressure.
Discovery isn't typically a passive process. There is a degree of language barrier since English isn't Minna's native language, but it seems unlikely that a process to identify mages wouldn't be a big priority.
Historically there's stigma against men using seidr so it is possible that boys aren't tested or there's even social pressure for boys to ignore any signs.No trace of that in the info page (or the comic) beyond saying that seiður are "predominately [sic!] female". (And while Reynir did make his gender into an awkward topic (http://sssscomic.com/comic2.php?page=54) while visiting the academy, I'm not under the impression he would've gotten any stink-eye before having embarrassed himself.)
I'm not sure we're working from the same page here - according to Minnas statements, SSSS magic is a gift from the old (pre-Christian) gods, who abstain from interfering with humans who belong to another pantheon (mainly the old Finnish gods', who reciprocrate). She even explained that the few Danes who do have a magic talent got it as a gift from the Nordic gods, not to mention all of the Danes being equipped with a fylgja, a rather Nordic-specific piece of equipment, in spite of their disbelief in it. And Christianity dropped out of the post-Rash world to the point of Onni barely knowing it existed until they ran into Anne.
Anne was christian. Her faith in the christian god, according to her as stated in comic, is what protected her from losing her sense of self and she was preserved, fully capable of proceeding to the afterlife, for 90 years waiting for help to come. Anne's protection began during the collapse of the old world, before the old religions took back over, back when christianity was hale and healthy.No, I don't have a problem with the statement that if Anne had divine help, it would have had to come from Christianity - that's the religion she was 100% looking to, and as I said, Minna did confirm that the post-Rash deities work on a pronounced "my folks first, hands off somegod else's" basis. (Yes, folks, not individuals.) And sure, if the Christian God sees that someone (Sleipnope) has collected all the lost Christian souls (ghosts) from large parts of Denmark (the only place where "the cure" created those) and gets close to what probably is the last Christian priest in the Known World, trying to arrange them meeting would sure be in His interest.
Look if you want to say that Anne was actually preserved by Odin, okay, sure.