Preparations - Prologue Y0 and chapters 1&2

[thorny]

Could be; but I think not guaranteed. The hair's dark, but the texture, like the skin color, looks to me to be ambiguous.

The discussion includes the general and false assumption that everyone, adults included, in the year 90 must be many generations from the year-zero population -- one person's even saying 8 generations, though somebody calls them on that one; but someone assuming 4 to 6 seems to be thought reasonable. (thorny, straight Ashkenazi from grandparents born in the late 1800's, and old but not ancient herself in 2022.)

[JoB]

(thorny, straight Ashkenazi from grandparents born in the late 1800's, and old but not ancient herself in 2022.)

(Your grandparents being born 1890-ish and you in 1950 would still be a perfect match for the usual ~30y range of familial generations, and of course be entirely unrelated to social generations of about 20y. Of course, translating 90y to 6 or more (S)Gs - assuming that the Rash was an event sufficiently cataclysmical to "force" a turn of SGs - is still right out.)

[lwise]

Taru's father, Veeti, was old enough to remember the Rash.  And Taru's not old.  Also, Trond's parents were adults during the Rash, and he's old but not that old.

Which makes me think, how old were Michael and Signe?  I'm not good at guessing ages, especially not of cartoon characters.  Given the responsibilities that Michael appears to have had (but not performed), I think he has to be mature: thirties, even forties.  But Signe might be younger, maybe mid-twenties.  Mikkel was born about Y56, so if she was 25 when the Rash came, she was 81 when he was born.  Many people of 81 are vigorous and live into their 90's.  If Signe was healthy all the way to 90, Mikkel could have talked to her when he was a boy.  Maybe that's why he wanted to be an astronaut: Signe told him about moonshots and Mars rovers.

[tehta]

Signe looks/acts older than that, to me. She has that world-weary waitress air, which I wouldn't expect from a woman in her 20s.

Regarding the generations, if we follow the parts of the family tree that do sort of make sense, we have someone like Ensi, born around the Rash, as a reasonable grandmother figure. If Ensi had two black parents and a very black appearance, but then had kids with a pale Scandinavian, I would not be shocked if her grand-kids still looked recognizably black. Or if they didn't, actually. But the option is definitely there.

[Jitter]

And, as pointed out in the discussion, very much darker skin tones may well crop up several generations later if both parents have black ancestry. It’s a combination of many genes which may carry far.

Which makes me wonder, in works set very far into the future, I mean year 3000+ our reckoning, would it be possible to have all white (or all anything) humans, if the world is supposed to be either an utopia with no racism, or a dystopia with limited pool of survivors so that couples would unlikely be constantly formed between people of similar appearances. Or, an utopia with few survivors, or… never mind.

Another thing, someone had posted street view of the church towers seen on p 127, and here is the street Tuuri rushes off into: https://www.google.no/maps/@61.007165,14.543449,3a,75y,299.62h,93.95t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1swbVxayFEBZLaDHzv1JJ7_A!2e0

[tehta]

Wow, that view looks very Swedish!

A thought: Emil didn't pay for the explosives in his bag, did he? (He surely couldn't.) No, I guess he took them from his job. No wonder he didn't have permits.

[Jitter]

I think so too. There’s discussion about what will the customs officers do with them (the explosives) and I want to be able to participate in that and say the stuff will be returned to its rightful owner, i.e. the Cleanser corps.

I’m not going to get through the comments even with the catch up week… next week, new chapter, new thread, the Dalahästen!

[NightMareMage]

Prologue Y0: 56-65. I think I read all the comments for these pages.

90 years later is a good time to start the story. Almost everyone alive in year 0 would be dead but in terms of human history, it is not the longest time frame but still leaving room for plenty of things to have happened, like outbreaks and their relative ends. (And it’s a round number but not as distractingly round as 100/hj.)

I am assuming that Taru and Trond “trimming some fat” and taking advantage of people is not something new to them. I read somewhere that Minna said that everyone who agreed to go knew the danger but it can be hard to read it that way, and even then, Siv, Torbjörn, Taru and Trond don’t come out of this looking good.

Are the character’s heights off on page 65 or is it just perspective?
 

And what do we think about the fruit juice scene? I don't really have a problem with fruit juice being expensive -- fresh juice is expensive even now! But it really should be alcohol. So my headcanon is that 'juice' is Y90 slang for booze.

It could just be that alcohol is more expensive. Best I could find, IRL Iceland has expensive alcohol. I do like the headcanon about juice being slang for booze.

[dmeck7755]

I do like the headcanon about juice being slang for booze.

As long as people have been around...they have fermented/distilled stuff.

That and another profession...

[lwise]

I am assuming that Taru and Trond “trimming some fat” and taking advantage of people is not something new to them. I read somewhere that Minna said that everyone who agreed to go knew the danger but it can be hard to read it that way, and even then, Siv, Torbjörn, Taru and Trond don’t come out of this looking good.

On the other hand ... the team kicked around in Silent Denmark for weeks (going by the growth of the kitten) with only one, relatively unserious injury.  The danger really wasn't that great until they ran into the danger of the ghosts, which was totally unanticipated by anybody including the organizers.  If the bridge had not collapsed, this would indeed have been the vacation that Sigrun anticipated.

[NightMareMage]

On the other hand ... the team kicked around in Silent Denmark for weeks (going by the growth of the kitten) with only one, relatively unserious injury.  The danger really wasn't that great until they ran into the danger of the ghosts, which was totally unanticipated by anybody including the organizers.  If the bridge had not collapsed, this would indeed have been the vacation that Sigrun anticipated.

That is a good point. It does not erase them advantage of people but this is something to keep in mind.

[tehta]

On the other hand ... the team kicked around in Silent Denmark for weeks (going by the growth of the kitten) with only one, relatively unserious injury.  The danger really wasn't that great until they ran into the danger of the ghosts, which was totally unanticipated by anybody including the organizers.  If the bridge had not collapsed, this would indeed have been the vacation that Sigrun anticipated.

I think the real potential for danger came not from the regular, known trolls/giants/etc, but the unknown. Which they did run into, with the ghosts. In Finland they might have run into the Kade; elsewhere there may be other Kade -like beings. Similarly, there could be other ghost-hordes, formed in other ways. There could be other intelligent monsters, or giants the size of cities. Nobody knows.

I think that's why one of the reasons the Nordic Council has been against exploratory missions: the high variance of the risk. I'm order to have a chance, you'd want to send in trained professionals of at least Sigrun and Lalli's experience, but possibly better-adjusted. Do you want to risk losing such people?

There are other reasons, of course, such as the fact that most of the national representatives on the council are likely 'meh' at best regarding exploration.

[NightMareMage]

Pages 69-78

There are some art style changes as the story goes. This makes some characters look off on reread. Like Emil and Onni.

So many details on page 71, panel 1! Lalli stepping out of his shoes, the blankets under the bed, how sparse and impersonal his room is.

Part of Lalli’s introduction is him hissing at a cat!

Onni’s haircut, per ear injury.

Onni’s hostility makes all the more sense after learning the Hotakainen family’s backstory…

The final panel on page 72, I think Tuuri’s line is meant to show/reassure the reader that she (and the others, stans Lalli) have not been misled by agreeing to join but it could also be read as Tuuri only believing that she is not being taken advantage of.

I don’t believe this level of confusion or memory issues that Lalli shows appears later. Maybe he was just not paying attention at the time?

As someone who has packed for things often, I buy that Tuuri forgot. I may forget a thing or two but people who have not traveled a lot seem to forget so much.

Given that Tuuri was dead set on going, did Lalli just get caught up in the shuffle or did Onni want Lalli to at least be with her?

Everything with Tuuri is just sad when you know what happens. Her setting out might be the worst. I wonder if things would have been different if Onni was there…

[Suominoita]

Pages 69-78


Given that Tuuri was dead set on going, did Lalli just get caught up in the shuffle or did Onni want Lalli to at least be with her?

The boat was leaving and Tuuri pushed Lalli in before Onni managed to react. Lalli's just uncertainly saying bye to Onni. Once they're on the boat Tuuri tries once more to convince Onni to come but he -- can't. He's not trying to get either one back on shore though, I suppose he gave up on that approach already. Maybe he wonders if calling his sister an idiot for going would have made a difference. And Lalli was not really paying much attention -- sleep deprivation and not really believing she would do something Onni didn't approve of -- that she was just telling her "weird jokes" he never understood. My guess is that Onni coined that term, trying to explain to Lalli why something Tuuri said wasn't all that important.

[thorny]

Lalli didn't seem to understand where they were going, or that they wouldn't be back shortly. See pages 79 and 80 in chapter 1.