Key posts by Minna through the comments and on twitch

[Sunflower]

In my skald-ish pursuit of more info about the world of SSSS, I've been re-reading aRTD, this time paying attention to Minna's comments under each page.  The comment on page 158 was intriguing.

You see, Our Creator had a different working title for SSSS before settling on its current title.  And apparently it was spoileriffic!  Based on her comments, maybe some clever folks can try to reverse-engineer its Original Name.  Or would it be like pronouncing the Tetragrammaton (or maybe the Nine Billion Names of God)?
In her own words:

[The working title] was the most spoileriffic name for anything ever in the history of names. Seriously, I can't even write it down here without completely breaking my rule of not revealing too much of the story yet, it's almost on par with "oh, hello there, this comic is about this and that and such!". Alright, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, but only a bit. Other than that failure it was actually not that bad of a title, and it was only one single long word, which in itself is already pretty cool. I was a little tempted to just go ahead and keep it as the real title on that one merit alone. But awww, point one was, and is, the most important criteria for choosing a name, and I just knew that part was going to bug me until the day I day I die. So, garbage can, meet failed title.


BTW, here's how she came to choose Stand Still, Stay Silent:

It fills all of the criteria I had set for an acceptable name for the comic.
One: It should not give away anything about the story, yet it should refer to a significant concept in the comic in such a way that someone reading the comic will get it.

Two: It should provide at least some possibility for a bit of fun typographic experimentation. Let's see what we have here; four almost equally sized words, divided in two equal parts. Yup, that's workable.

Three: The abbreviation of the name should be at least somewhat memorable. You know, nothing insane like LPLHRTTG. And since Stand still. Stay silent gets a very simple abbreviation in the form of SSSS, that's a clear pass on this point too. That's three out of three, title accepted!

[JoB]

Based on her comments, maybe some clever folks can try to reverse-engineer its Original Name.

Hmmm. I don't have a feeling that we already know enough of "this comic is about this and that and such" to seriously attempt that, I'm afraid. For example, once they're in the Silent Lands, we could get a boatload of monsters as main characters, in the style of Derelict's This One.

Also, I'ld take the statement that that oh-so-descriptive title is just one word as a hint that it likely was in Finnish (which IIUC is about as good in making fresh compound nouns compote as German is ).

[Sunflower]

I'ld take the statement that that oh-so-descriptive title is just one word as a hint that it likely was in Finnish (which IIUC is about as good in making fresh compound nouns compote as German is ).

Heh, I bet you're right, judging by the lyrics of Värttinä songs (almost my only exposure to written Finnish until recently).  A sample:

Santa saappahaisilleni utu ummiskengilleni
ummiskengilleni kengilleni joono

Satoi neljä neitokaista valoi vihmasta raetta
neljä neitokaista neitokaista joono

Anna tupa tullakseni ovensuuta ollakseni
tupa tullakseni tullakseni joono

I gather this is some sort of folk song or jump-rope rhyme the band adapted... but if this tongue-twister is what Finnish *kids* sing, no wonder Finnish mages are so good at spoken spells!

[BabaYaga]

When I read that the original title reveals too much, I imagined it revealing something horrible like "Only Half of Us Came Back", "In Memoriam" or "How We Became Trolls". Happy thoughts. 

All joking aside, this single long word would be very descriptive if it had something to do with Finnish or Scandinavian mythology, it could have been some mythological being or name or term that will have great significance later in the story, like Ragnarök or something. (Now, cue in the mythology experts we have aboard.)

[BrainBlow]

Well, I doubt this comic is going to have a downer ending or something like that, so that would probably rule out the possibility of the title name being a word that can describe a terrible situation.

[tesseract]

I'll take a wild guess: Sampo.

[BrainBlow]

I'll take a wild guess: Sampo.

Which translates to...?

[FrogEater]

I felt this is a finnish word ...

[Mayabird]

Ooh, that's a thought.  Our Motley Heroes would be the sampo, bringing endless treasures and goods back to civilization? 

This makes me think Emil is going to clear out an abandoned jewelry store in Copenhagen though.  "Well, we didn't get all the books, buuuuut..." *dumps out sack full of gold chains and diamond rings*

[shauhagah]

This makes me think Emil is going to clear out an abandoned jewelry store in Copenhagen though.  "Well, we didn't get all the books, buuuuut..." *dumps out sack full of gold chains and diamond rings*

Do you think the jewellery stores would still have stuff in them or would people have stolen everything as civilisation collapsed?

You'd think that would be one of the first places people would hit, after supermarkets.

[FrogEater]

... and after armouries...

[Mayabird]

Do you think the jewellery stores would still have stuff in them or would people have stolen everything as civilisation collapsed?

You'd think that would be one of the first places people would hit, after supermarkets.

Yeah, probably, but I like the mental image.

Also the mental image of Emil thinking that he's gonna be rich beyond his wildest dreams, but he brings so much loot back that he crashes the jewelry market.  At least the diamonds also have industrial uses...

[shauhagah]

 

Also the mental image of Emil thinking that he's gonna be rich beyond his wildest dreams, but he brings so much loot back that he crashes the jewelry market.  At least the diamonds also have industrial uses...

Yeah I can imagine him trying to fit everything on the mystery vehicle. At least jewellery won't take up as much room as books. I hope it can carry a lot of weight.

[Rabbit]

Maybe we can make Minna set "reveal the original title" as a stretch goal for book five or so...

[ruth]

is anyone familiar with the font that minna uses to typeset the comic? it looks very cool, but i've never seen any that are even remotely similar so i don't know where to start with looking for it.