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Sketches + Commentary: The Funeral
🕑 Added 2020-09-23 12:52:47 +0000 UTC
Okay so...The Funeral. Initially this chapter was called “A Funeral for a Universally Beloved Figure” but since that’s kind of the Joke aspect of Jane’s whole speech, we pared it down to be more simple.
The last two updates were a little lighter, a little less ‘evil dictator brutally disciplines local teenager in front of a room full of spectators’, so welcome back. It’s Homestuck.
PANEL 303
Kim’s art! As usual. What a lovely looking church. I would definitely want to go to church there, if I went to church, which I haven’t since I was maybe 15.
The fact that there even ARE churches on Earth C is, on the face of it, pretty strange. But taking into the fact that so much of it is just aping modern American culture, which is where ⅔ of the kids come from, it makes sense. And not even REAL American culture, just the impression of it that you get when you turn on the tv. They made churches for the same reason that they adopted capitalism and liberal democracy.
That said, you’ll notice the color scheme of the stained glass. Derse and Prospit are still heavy in the minds of the Earth C inhabitants.
PANEL 304
Ladies, gentlemen, and news outlets. The three genders.
PANEL 305
Jake is here on Yiffy-sitting duty, and Jane has maneuvered that to be in the most degrading way possible, for both of them. Imagine having to keep your granddaughter on a leash because your crazy dictator wife doesn’t want her to yeet out of there. Brain Ghost Dirk is probably really beginning to regret his decision to come on this wild ride.
PANEL 306
The three of them are really suffering here. This speech is pretty unbearable. Have any of you guys ever seen a Politics done? It’s pretty bad. People say all sorts of obviously untrue bullshit, and everyone just stands around nodding like it’s the deepest shit that ever got uttered. What you say often doesn’t matter, it’s how you say it, and how many incomprehensible buzzwords you use while you’re doing it.
Jane really is a born politician. It’s a pity about, you know. Everything.
PANEL 307
We get a little bit of Jake’s feelings toward the proceedings and, as usual, they’re fairly blasé. Jake has reached a point with Jane that even the worst shit she does in front of him results in a sort of meh. Which, to be fair, is necessary, since he’s undercover and all of that. But on another level, it’s a defense mechanism. If you don’t change your situation and you don’t escape, then the only other choice you have is to become numbed, and in a way, complicit.
Jake is doing this for the greater good, of course, but at the end of the day, isn’t he still holding a girl on a leash?
PANEL 308
Gaaah this panel is so fucking good. I love everything about it. The composition is so dynamic, there’s so many things going on. Yiffy’s cleats look amazing. She’s so cool.
Most of what Jane is saying in this speech is nonsense garbage, which it’s meant to be, but it just strikes me as particularly funny that she brings up her upbringing as lacking privilege. That she’s using a eulogy as a chance to build herself up and call the deceased a dumb asshole.
Did Jane actually care about Gamzee? I think it’s possible that she did. Or I guess, “hated” Gamzee, since he was her Kismesis. But according to quadrant theory, you can be in hate with someone and still value them. That’s the whole point of blackrom, at least in theory. So did Jane value Gamzee? Maybe. Is that going to stop her from milking his death to the nth degree that it can be? Absolutely not.
PANELS 309-312
In Andrew’s original outline, this series of panels here were Yiffy dancing wildly on top of Gamzee’s coffin until it breaks. I think it might have even been tap-dancing at some point? Yiffy started out with way more of an elegant aesthetic, but it really wasn’t working, and besides, Joey Claire has that market cornered. So when we went with jock instead, the dancing didn’t really fit anymore, so Kim decided to have her just stomping like crazy, while Jane gets angrier and angrier and continues to try to give her speech while this nasty teen is making a mockery of her important press event.
PANELS 313-315
Such a pain, when the electroshock color you’re using on a troublesome teenager doesn’t make her listen to you.
PANEL 316
Look at BGD there, just chilling. Man, nothing ever phases this guy.
Jake arguing with Brain Ghost Dirk (i.e. himself) while a bunch of important bullshit that could use an adult goes down is, admittedly, very on brand.
I initially put “cuntwaffle” in as a placeholder and then decided that I liked it.
PANELS 317-319
Finally, Jane is forced to give up on her speech. It was a valiant effort, Jane. You did your best.
More physical comedy with Gamzee’s corpse. Seriously though, guys, there was so much more of it in Andrew’s original outline. He just really loves tossing this motherfucker around. Yiffy is being very disrespectful of the dead here, but really no more disrespectful than Jane is being, at the end of the day. Using his death as political farce.
PANELS 320-321
Jane’s behavior in the Epilogues and beyond veers into the cartoonish at times, which I think is the nature of the story (homestuck) but also the nature of Jane Crocker. She’s always had a dramatic streak; consider her love of cosplay and gumshoes, her affected 1930’s accent, and her deep, laborious, half made-up love affair with Jake back during the game. That isn’t to say there’s anything inherently wrong with those things--that’s how many teenagers are, especially isolated ones. But then you take that and add layers of PTSD, godhood, the intense pressure of being a mythical figure and you get...Madam Crocker. The Jeff Bezos of Earth C, with added racial cleansing.
The shit she’s saying to Yiffy here makes it pretty clear that the problem she has with Yiffy is not with her, but with her parents. And with her refusal to be grateful for what she’s been offered, when she’s a nuisance whose only real purpose here is to create chaos.
IDK if that’s gonna fly for Yiffy, though.
PANEL 322
Even Jake and Dirk are like, damn.
PANEL 323
Yiffy’s had it with this shit. When I was writing this I was thinking a lot about the last person we saw stand up to Jane, i.e. Karkat, years ago back when he told her to go fuck herself and then ran off to start an insurgency. Yiffy’s style is a little less wordy and a little more growly.
And here we get Gamzee punted out into the crowd, for the last time, if I have anything to say about it.
I know the treatment of Gamzee has been a sore subject for some people. It’s true, Gamzee’s redemption arc was a “joke” in that same way that all of Candy was a “joke”. That is to say, it was a deconstruction and caricature of what happens after the story is over. The falling action, the Harry Potter epilogue where everyone shows up in perfect heterosexual marriages with their kids, and Harry is a cop. It plucks at the absurdity of happily ever after in the first place.
PANEL 324
Jake is extremely admiring of the fact that Yiffy has had it with this shit. Have you ever been in a position like Jake’s? Not his exact position, i.e. the trophy husband of a maniacal capitalist intent on knocking boots with the worst person in the world. But in a bad situation where escape seems impossible, and then someone else strides in and does the exact same thing you were terrified of like it’s no problem? It can be really disheartening and alarming, but also inspiring, at times. Because it doesn’t make the fear go away, but it does remind you that fear is something you can take control of.
PANEL 325
Jane has also had it with this shit. She’s tired of people not listening to her; people have been not listening to her all day.
PANEL 326
Oh no. I wonder who that could be...
See you next time!
Comments
dogexmachina
so did jane gain access to her pre-retcon selfs memories or did gamzee offer the blood when they first met in candy, off screen?
Tinokel
Ok. So. That glass. In the first and second panel. Immediately had me think of this: https://i.imgur.com/2xyJLTs.jpg it's vanilla/strawberry custard.
Madame Hardy
These are always fun to read; thank you! Aysha said you'd thrown the original Hussie outline into the Outer Darkness; I'm glad to see that was a humorous exaggeration.
greedlikes
very well said in every regard. love readin shit like this 😼
