Another World L

No responses to “Another World L”

CptNerd on February 19, 2014 at 9:43 AM

I believe the page number should be “XL” not “L” unless you’re jumping 10 pages…
Syncline on February 19, 2014 at 11:55 AM

Oh my God I love Val so much for this whole intervention.
My hero.
E&L, you rock.
Dark Rose on February 19, 2014 at 3:28 PM

How many more pages are there for this chapter?
Hitokiri Akins on February 19, 2014 at 5:29 PM

Dark Val: And what? You expect me to change? You expect your words are going to make me see “the Light”? Got news for you; things don’t work that way. I have seen and done more than you ever will, and I don’t intend to change because some sidekick from another universe says her way is better.

At least, that’s what I imagine her next line will be.
Syncline on February 19, 2014 at 10:42 PM

Being a hero is doing the right thing when no one cares and no one cheers
You don’t speak out to an injustice expecting change from a monster.
You do it because someone has to speak if anything is ever going to change and push monsters out of power.

And most of the time, nothing happens.
No one remembers the thousands who rotted alongside Mandela.
No one remembers the thousands who died long before Gandhi.
The strange fruit hanging in American trees.
But when people keep speaking out, change does come.
Hitokiri Akins on February 20, 2014 at 8:08 AM

Yeah, that’s a good line from Dark Val, too. Where’s that from?
Syncline on February 22, 2014 at 6:11 AM

It’s a better line from OUR val, since speaking out against a monster is exactly what she’s doing.
That isn’t a quote. Unless you’re quoting me.
Hitokiri Akins on February 27, 2014 at 7:01 PM

I really wish your view of a black and white universe was the the reality. Where what is right is right, and what is wrong is wrong, and there is no grey. Where the good guys do the right thing all the time, and the bad guys are punished for their actions, and reform while they are punished. But that’s not how things work.

And here’s the thing; our fiction, especially our superhero fiction, reflects our reality. And our reality isn’t all black and white; grey is not only the reality, it is the norm.

Don’t get me wrong; the black and white view is a valid one. I encourage people to fight for the right thing the right way. But sometimes, horrible things must be done in order for the greater good to be served.
Spliced on February 20, 2014 at 4:28 PM

I don’t say the things I say to people who do the right thing for the wrong reasons with any real hope it will change them. I say it because it needs to be said.

I think that’s what Syncline was going for too. That you don’t stand up to the Dark, hoping it will see the Light. You do it because you need to.
Hitokiri Akins on February 20, 2014 at 9:11 PM

And I’m saying that what Syncline said could have been said by Dark Val, even though it was said as a rebuttal to what I thought Dark Val might have said in the next panel. That “doing the right thing when no one cares and no one cheers” could be the very same justification that Dark Val might have for her actions.
Syncline on February 22, 2014 at 6:28 AM

Dark Val is not “speaking out’ – she is acting as judge, jury, and executioner because she can and no one can stop her.
That makes her the Monster, not the Hero, and her dialoging is just villain posturing.
She can speak out whenever she wants, because she has shown what happens to people who speak out against her. That isn’t heroism- it’s unchecked power.

Anybody who tells her to straighten the hell out is putting their life on the line to do it, and the evidence for it is pretty clear. Our world has a separation between those who enforce the law and those who punish lawbreakers for many reasons, but the main one is simple- unchecked absolute power corrupts. It destroys whatever humanity you have, and always has.
Those who speak out against it take their lives in their hands and always have.

At this very moment the US government is threatening an 80-year old nun with 30 years in prison for embarrassing the federal government of the united states over the security of it’s nuclear arsenal. The fact that she demonstrated her organizations’ concerns were absolutely valid is the primary reason the federal prosecutors are so upset. Yet she says she has no regrets. That is a hero.
The Wyrm Ouroboros on February 23, 2014 at 12:40 AM

“… because she can and no one can stop her.”

… huh. You’re apparently missing about 95% of the realities and clear and unambiguous legalities of DVal’s world – she doesn’t do it because ‘she can and no one can stop her’, she does it because she has proven her competence to do so. Because she is of the people, has been authorized by the people, and acts for the people, when murderers refuse to surrender. Our world has clear separations between arresting officer, judge, jury, and executioner, yes – and all those get boiled down to one person if the guy with the bloody knife, standing amonst the remains of his two dozen victims, tells the one cop with a pistol to go screw himself.

The cop is gonna shoot to kill. And he’ll go before a review board, and they’ll ask him what happened, and you know what? He’ll be cleared.

Syncline, you keep howling that Dark Val is a monster and a bad guy wearing a good-guy ribbon, but you keep missing the fact that Dark Val is a cop. One who just might have to go before a Board of Review and say just what the cop with the gun faced with the mass-murderer with the knife would: “I asked him to surrender. He refused. I shot him. Now he’s dead, and he won’t be killing any more people, and I only wish I’d gotten to him before he killed thirty people.” In Dark Val’s case, that’s not just thirty norms, that’s thirty superheroes, and the guy could have killed everyone else.

I mean, holy crap.
Hitokiri Akins on February 23, 2014 at 10:12 AM

I really wish your view of a black and white universe was the the reality. Where what is right is right, and what is wrong is wrong, and there is no grey. Where the good guys do the right thing all the time, and the bad guys are punished for their actions, and reform while they are punished. But that’s not how things work.

And here’s the thing; our fiction, especially our superhero fiction, reflects our reality. And our reality isn’t all black and white; grey is not only the reality, it is the norm.

Don’t get me wrong; the black and white view is a valid one. I encourage people to fight for the right thing the right way. But sometimes, horrible things must be done in order for the greater good to be served.
Syncline on February 26, 2014 at 6:39 AM

I live in the real world; I see grey every day. I and those I care for did time in service and some of us went on to be police, firemen, scientists. All of us have made hard decisions in our lives that no one will ever know about, because we try to live what we believe. Do the right thing.

Grey is easy; that’s why people end up doing it and trying to justify it later. When you choose to pull a vigilante stunt, any lazy act done out of anger and temporary power, OTHERS are always who suffer, never the clown doing it. Power protects power.

I thought a lot about examples I could give. I lot. But it would be wasted space and a disservice to those I hold dear. I said it already: heroism is doing the right thing when no one is looking and no one will ever know. Real heroes are out there. They risk their lives and even die and no one pins a goddamn medal on them and says nice things. We toil and even die for what we believe. And lazy, small-spirited say it’s antiquated and quaint. And then they pretend they had no choice but to be as dirty as whoever they oppose.

There is always a choice. Some of us have body counts. Bur our conscience is clear.
Jedidusk on February 19, 2014 at 6:47 PM

http://literacy.kent.edu/Minigrants/Cinci/romanchart.htm
CptNerd on February 19, 2014 at 7:10 PM

Yep. Last page was “XXXIX” this page should be “XL”, next page “XLI”…
Scuffles on February 20, 2014 at 6:30 AM

Well that told her…
Gin on February 24, 2014 at 1:23 PM

Am I the only one who giggled a little at “Oh. Well, yes, actually.”? It seems like she expected DVal to fight back and is somewhat pleasantly surprised that DVal is going to stand there and let her say her piece.

Typically a “bad guy” isn’t going to let you tell him how much of a jerk he’s being until he’s a bruised heap on the ground. DVal, to me, just proved she is still a hero, despite her clearly cynical view of the world.

Also have to agree with everyone further up who are comparing DVal to a cop; supers in Val’s universe fit a particular niche in society and cater to the public with specific images, stereotypes, and encounters with “villains” that have to follow such a specific rule book that they almost seem scripted, while in DVal’s universe she (and by extension other supers) seems to hold a position more closely resembling a police officer’s. DVal’s universe seems to take villains much more seriously than Val’s does.
Coriolis on February 25, 2014 at 4:46 PM

Considering the sheer number of heroes, sidekicks, and (no doubt), normals that this guy killed, I think DVal was entirely justified.And, as noted, in her world she may have in fact been elected/authorized to the job. And when you get to a villian that dangerous (I put him up there with Empowered’s Deathmonger, who has very similar abilities. Actually, Toymaker’s worse, Deathmonger is only limited to puppetting people). If youget a shot, you don’t pull your punch.

One thing to remember: there is no ambiguity, because of the very fact that the story is being told to us; we WITNESS his actions. We SEE what he’s done, and we know it for fact (in story context). It’s when there are no witnesses, when it’s cop-said/accused-says, then you have to ask “did it really go down that way, or is the cop covering his ass?”
Syncline on February 26, 2014 at 6:57 AM

It will be a streamlined and efficient government our readership will assemble when one of you buys an election. And a police state it will be. Bad people will be punished, it’s true. Harshly…and the inevitable bad eggs will rise to the power they always crave. How unfortunate.
And people will wring their hands about it until someone grows a pair.

And the same stupid story will play out in blood all over again.

That whole separation of powers bullshit you all seem to despise?
MILLIONS died to build those slow and sometimes kludgy institutions in the US and elsewhere. The democracies of the world float on a gigantic sea of blood that was shed by it’s own citizens to keep those governments and their shortsighted and lazy members free. Or at least somewhat free.
And the alternatives are all far, far worse.

How casually people throw away the work of centuries in the pursuit of a faster and more efficient future police state.
Gin on February 26, 2014 at 10:10 AM

Ok, is anyone here actually advocating for a police state to be instated in our reality? No?

This is FICTION. Where FICTIONAL things happen. We haven’t seen the government of DVal’s universe, so we have no idea if it’s a “police state” either. There are clearly civilians, as DVal mentioned them, and it doesn’t seem as though DVal or the Light have any power over those civilians.

This seems to be a universe where SUPERS are allowed to police SUPERS because SUPERS are equipped to handle other SUPERS. We have not heard a word about DVal dealing with civilians.

A couple pages back, one of the lower level supers mentions DVal has the authority to deal with villains. VILLAINS, not criminals, which seems to be a very commonly used distinction between super-powered bad guys (or the ones operating at that level) and the mundane crime-committing people.

So no, nobody here wants a police state four ourselves. We don’t have super powered people to deal with that would require either MOBILIZING THE MILITARY ON A REGULAR BASIS ON OUR OWN SOIL or, as in DVal’s case, letting them police themselves and hope we don’t get caught in the crossfire. I don’t put Val’s universe’s model in the options because honestly, can you see our reality allowing supers to operate he way they do in Val’s world? … Actually, with how we already let celebrities get away with things, that may be more in line with what would happen. That’s a depressing thought.

So, point of this ramble: nobody is advocating a police state. This system that has been developed appears to work for DVal’s universe in its dealings with SUPER HEROES and VILLAINS. We have no idea how civilians and mundane crimes are handled here, so how can you say we want a police state?

Also, “that whole separation of powers bullshit you all seem to despise.” Sees most people are applying that “dislike” of the separation mostly to proven cases of murder and such, not general practice.
The Wyrm Ouroboros on February 26, 2014 at 7:34 PM

Who ever said they despised seperation of powers?? It’s a real and necessary operation of civilization, and prevents a hell of a lot of abuse. We aren’t saying we don’t like it (or gods forbid, want a police state); we are arguing against your proclamation that Val ‘the Dark’ is a contemptable hypocrite evil villian who just happens to be on the side of the good guys.

Syncline, you’re the only one here who’s claiming a black-and-white scenario. SK-Val lives in what is a Silver Age world; bad guys go to prison but not forever, and I can only presume that their body count is low to nil, otherwise executions by the government would be handed down in court. I will not say what I think of what you’re saying about you or your friends’ personal lives; in an infinite universe, everything is possible. But you keep refusing to admit that:

Bad Guy was asked to surrender. If Bad Guy had surrendered, he would have been:
arrested
arraigned
put on trial
and sentenced
all in stated accordance with the laws that Dark Val upholds. Go read what she said this time; then come back.
However, Bad Guy did not surrender. Therefore, in accordance with the laws of the land, which are far closer to real life:
Bad Guy (who could defend against standard attacks) was attacked with lethal force, and killed.

Yeah, SK-Val thinks that’s a shitty thing to do; SK-Val lives in a superheroic ‘beat the bad guys into submission even if they don’t surrender, not killing is what makes us “better” than them’ world. SK-Val is saying what she thinks. Wunderbar. That makes her neither completely right, nor completely wrong; it does, however, put her right where she is – completely out of her league, in a world whose rules she doesn’t understand, in a situation that she thinks she understands but essentially doesn’t – because she doesn’t know the rules.

Yes, we appreciate Gandhi and Mandela for their work. We also appreciate cops and soldiers, people who do the dirty work so the rest of us don’t have to.

I also want to point out that if you have a body count but your conscience is clear, you are the monster you are claiming us to be. Nobody I’ve ever met who has justifiably killed in the line of duty and come away reasonably sane has ever had a clear conscience about their actions.
Syncline on February 28, 2014 at 6:22 AM

The positions aren’t gonna move.
Especially since this is the world you think you live in:
http://superbitchcomic.com/comic/bell-on-earth/
Hitokiri Akins on February 28, 2014 at 10:23 AM

Since I couldn’t reply there, I’m going to add it here; the fact that you use the inclusive “we” in your statement about real heroes; “We toil and even die for what we believe.”, shows you believe yourself to be a “real hero”.

That shows that you are not a hero at all; real heroes don’t need to be recognized for their actions. They want to do what is right without having others make a big deal out of it. In your own words, they want to “do the right thing when no one cheers.” (Which I still believe you got from somewhere else, because I KNOW I’ve seen it before you.) So before you start pointing fingers…make sure you hands are clean!

“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own?”
toma on February 27, 2014 at 5:50 AM

Considering that D’Val is normally locked in a magical box that keeps her in stasis until an alternate Val is summoned to let her out, and the ONLY reason that she would be let out is if some villain was so powerful that no one else could stop him…

Doesn’t that make her more like a weapon, rather then a police woman? If she is a weapon, a force of nature, so powerful that she will kill when let out, then isn’t that sort of absolving her of the moral responsibility, at least in part, and placing it on the people that let her out to begin with? Those heroes, knew EXACTLY what she would do but they did it anyway. They wanted her to be the judge, the jury, and the executioner.

The blood is on their hands, as much as it is on D’Vals.

That said, she did offer him the chance to surrender, which he refused. Seems to me, that it’s more of a case of suicide, rather then homicide. Rather like the guy that is surrounded by gun wielding police officers and is told to surrender but, instead he just pulls out his gun to randomly fire and gets taken down in a hail of bullets. What this super villain did here seems equally stupid.
Syncline on February 28, 2014 at 6:24 AM

That is by far the best argument I’ve heard. Point made.
Succorelle on March 4, 2014 at 10:57 PM

Whether she was right to kill him or not at this point is kind of moot at this point (and frankly I’m a bit concerned by how vehement some people seem about this argument – is it because it bears such striking comparisons to the Death Penalty argument?).

Instead, I’d like to bring up a point that people don’t seem much interested in arguing: right or wrong, DVal is dangerously overpowered. She is used to being right, judging by how much she gets away with walking all over people. But she is still a human being, and all human beings are wrong on occasion. Have any of you guys met someone who is right 99% of the time and they know it? Good luck convincing them when they ARE wrong – they’ll start World War Three to avoid being proven incorrect. Hell, Satan was an angel before he let his pride convince him he was right.

On this page, Val is completely right – DVal may be justified, or she might not be, but she is inarguable a massively shitty person. And honestly, that’s just inexcusable.
The Wyrm Ouroboros on March 15, 2014 at 1:12 AM

“Judge not, lest ye be judged.”
“Pluck the timber from thine own eye before removing the splinter from your brother’s.”
“Do not judge a man until you have walked a mile in his moccasins.”

Both you and Syncline ignore all that advice, and go straight to the accusation that DVal is a monster/shitty person. Really? A shitty person for being a cop and following instructions, and holding a mass-murderer to his word (refusing to surrender), by removing his slaughtering ways from the earth when it is likely – with a probability nearing 100% – of that mass-murderer getting the chance to kill again and again? How many times has Joker, or any of Batman’s menaces, or Spider-Man’s, or Superman’s, etc. gotten free and killed more innocent people, because the villian (once surrendered/captured/arrested) gets to make use of a judicial system that is designed to not punish him until he can be declared sane, and thereby fit to stand trial???

Val can think DVal is shitty all she wants; she comes from a world where a large proportion of the villians and heroes are apparently totally frickin’ incompetent, that Capture and Incarceration is standard, and where Villian Body Count is low. Of course she’s going to think DVal is shitty, because she doesn’t live up to what Val thinks SHE would do with that power, because y’know, Val is a sidekick who deserves to be considered a full-on hero. SHE does all the work; Illumina the flake gets all the credit.

Val lives in a saccharine-sweet world, where even the Dark Mysterious Tragic Heroes get frickin’ registered and where despite her competence she can’t move into upper management because she doesn’t have an appropriate body shape or backstory. DVal isn’t a massively shitty person; SK-Val is totally fucking jealous.

Sidekick Girl

Saving the City: Sans-Spandex

No responses to “Another World L”