Endtown by Aaron Neathery for August 29, 2014

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    mr_sherman Premium Member over 10 years ago

    So what was her expertise in the past?

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    pam Miner  over 10 years ago

    Maybe she can persuade him to come with them.If I looked like she does, than it might be that she finds him attractive. He does look kinda sweet at the last.So we have 1 cat, 1 mouse, 1racoon, a young bird, and maybe 2 dragons, lizards, to resume the journey.

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    JusSayin  over 10 years ago

    I think Sarah may stage a coup. Thanks for all for the moral support. I’ll be okay. Ooh, Look! Shiny new voting links!

    Vote ENDTOWN

    Vote Doc Rat

    JusSayin

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    Ida No  over 10 years ago

    Sarah: "Why should I leave. The way I figure it, I could own this place by the end of the week. We’ll change the name to “Sarah’s Nest”, and you can be my chief concubine. This is going to be one sweet deal, you’re right."

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    Melkior  over 10 years ago

    Was that sarcasm or not? Difficult to tell. Does Sarah believe she can crack that xenophobic façade or is she being sarcastic and actually intends to leave them to their fate?

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    Space_cat  over 10 years ago

    Sarah is smart enough to see this is an genetic dead-end. All the valid concerns we have recently voiced about the unfortunate course this colony has taken are painfully obvious to her.All that weirdness aside folks..Who is curious enough to see a Cat or a Giraffe hatch from an egg?The thought had crossed my mind about 2 weeks ago and I laughed out loud at the very idea.It almost seems ridiculous..’If it weren’t for the Platypus.

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    Cheapskate0  over 10 years ago

    Thoughts:.Personal at Veteran: Don’t know if you got my reply, but I wasn’t making a jab, just noting that the information you cited could go either way….Back to the story: I would say we’re overdue in hearing from Wally, Holly, and Jim..As for the lizards, are we supposed to be angry at them? Or should we just feel really, really sorry for them?.It’s finally been said, definitively, that mutant offspring are not immune to the mutagenic virus. We’ve been guessing that, but now, we finally know..Is Sarah being sarcastic, or is she staying?.I would say that has a lot to do with whether she has feelings for Piotr or not. But, even if she does, I would rather see both Sarah and Piotr leaving, than the two of them staying..By now, I think it’s clear, Piotr has feelings for Sarah..But Piotr and Sarah both staying in Lizard Land would probably be the end of this arc – and perhaps the entire story..Indeed, Sarah staying behind would certainly signal the growing perception that, no matter how bad it is here and now, it only gets worse as we move on..But wait! I think I’ve said that before!

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    gcwh  over 10 years ago

    I am with the group of folks saying Sarah is going to just take over the place and set it on a better path.

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    Tue Elung-Jensen  over 10 years ago

    Only staying as long as needed – hopefully.

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    cindyorch  over 10 years ago

    if she did stay what about Jim???He mutated just for her….or love for her…we don’t know if that has changed along with their bodies. This is getting reeeally interesting…….

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    Darwinskeeper  over 10 years ago

    Cheapskate,“…are we supposed to be angry at them? Or should we just feel really, really sorry for them?”Both, neither, either or. Aaron is very good at writing ambiguous characters, people who you can cheer for at one point, hate in another and feel sorry for in other places. In the “Gustine’s Quest” story arc, he had a character named “Sparkplug” who tried to kill the main characters. Later he used dittos to explain Sparkplug’s history and what made him so unhinged. Later in that story arc we were introduced to Endtown’s Security Captain Philomena Flask who wanted to execute Al and Gustine for treason. Those who have followed her through the end of the quest story arc and “Countdown” have often hoped she would do the right thing, cringed when she didn’t, have hated her and occasionally felt sorry for her. I think it is the same with the Lizards. You can either hate them, feel sorry for them, hope that they will make better decisions. Maybe all of the above.

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    Darwinskeeper  over 10 years ago

    Sarah seems to be confirming that there is a limit to how much the mutagenic plague could change the laws of physics. A five foot human might be able to mutate into a 30 inch mouse or a 30 foot monster but mutant produced food products still aren’t free. The question is whether she’s being sarcastic and plans to leave or if she has some reason to stay and has some plan to fix things.

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    stevegallacci  over 10 years ago

    Veteran- I’m still WAG-ing that the virus was a deliberate weapon that went wrong/got out too early. As its effect is related to brain function, it may have been intended as an ideological weapon, either doing something good to those with the “correct” mindset or something bad to dissidents.

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    Dragoncat  over 10 years ago

    At the risk of sounding like an old western…I have the feeling Sarah wants to “clean up this one-species town”. Not a bad idea, really……Though, I fear that even with Piotr (and possibly Chic, as well), she’ll have her work cut out for her.…Does Holly still remember how to make cheese?

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    Robert Nowall Premium Member over 10 years ago

    “…as someone who knows her research.” That implies Sarah had something to do with the mutagenic virus—-studying? creating?

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    Coyoty Premium Member over 10 years ago

    “…as long as the mutagenic virus survives…” So she thinks it could die out eventually, according to her research. Could the virus have an expiration date? It’s airborne and everywhere, apparently. Isolating the host population wouldn’t be effective if the virus is independent of personal contact. Its designers could have intended to ride out the plague in protective isolation until its expiration and emerge to take over a weakened world, and either something went wrong or they’re still waiting somewhere.

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    ComicsDad5  over 10 years ago

    If any of you are on FB and would like to join a discussion group of Endtown enthusiasts,

    https://www.facebook.com/groups/Endtown.Appreciators/

    Thanks!

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    mr_sherman Premium Member over 10 years ago

    What/Why the mutagenic “virus”? First of all, let us understand that the mutagen has not been defined by Aaron as a virus, but by us readers. Considering how it acts, that is a good enough guess, so I will continue at least for now calling it such. It helps in my understanding of the What/Why question. Aaron has stated in the underground that the guard rats are NOT originally human. That may be a key. How did they become sentient if they weren’t human to begin with? Current genetic experiments sometimes use a virus to insert genetic material into the experimental call. This same process may have been used to insert human genetic information to enable the development of the frontal cortex along with the development of hands and bipedalism. They may have needed to develop a special virus to enable the transference of the genetic material. This virus may have been exceptionally viable to exist in the world and needed to be kept in extra special confinement to prevent its spread.What the scientists may not have known was that the virus may have done more than just deliver the human genetic information, but may have “picked up” comparable genetic information from the host cell. How new viruses are created without destroying the new transformed cell happen, I have no idea, but the new viruses could then infect a human, giving them the characteristics of the previous host. This may give rise to the possibility of there being animal/animal mutations.

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    Jenner Premium Member over 10 years ago

    What a Dump of a World, by JennerTo the tune of What a Wonderful World by Bob Thiele and George David Weiss, most associated with Louis Armstrong I see warriors strong – Pris’ners of fateWarm, welcome wordsAnd cold-blooded hateAnd I think to myself: What a dump of a worldI see friends of thoseWho look the same.Bright, open courtyardsDark halls of shameAnd I think to myself: What a dump of a worldThe chilly circulation in veins beneath the skinIs also in the treatment of people not your kinI see beckoning smiles, saying: How do you do?They’re really saying: I rob youI hear babies cryHatched in a nest.You pick your ownAnd eat the restAnd I think to myself: What a dump of a worldAnd I think to myself: What a dump of a world

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    Michelle Morris  over 10 years ago

    Is it me,or is this the Endtown version of the Jeff Foxworthy joke: “You might be a redneck if your family tree does not fork!”

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    Darwinskeeper  over 10 years ago

    My reference to mutant products being “free” was the concept that the lizardesses are producing more nutrients and biomass than they are taking in. For the colony to survive on the eggs and nonreptilian offspring that the ladies produce they must break the laws of physics to produce more than they take in. Curiously enough, the mutagen already does that, many of the mutations involve transforming into monsters that are much larger than the humans they mutated from. I had wondered if the mutant food production followed similar deviations to the laws of physics. Apparently not.

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    Darwinskeeper  over 10 years ago

    Rereading Sarah’s comment on panel 2 suggests a third possibility.“Eating your own eggs isn’t your ACE IN THE HOLE, either.. Its a dietary blind alley.. If you aren’t introducing fresh nutrients into the colony you’ll eventually all starve..”Note that she said “nutrients”, it may be possible that anthro lizards are able to produce more biomass than they take in but not the proteins, calcium and vitamins needed to sustain life. If the laws of nature played out in Lizardtown the same way they do in our world, the lack of outside food would force the Lizardess’ egg production to decrease to the point where the colony would have a food crisis in short order. The problem would be obvious to the point where nobody would be able to hide it. If we assume that the mutagen somehow allows female egg layers to subvert the laws of physics and produce biomass (like what happens in some mutations) then its possible for the Lizards to have a silent crisis where there seems to be enough eggs and meat to cover people’s needs but the food is just empty calories causing them to slowly die of malnutrition. Mind you, that doesn’t exactly sound like starvation. hmmmm…

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