See?! I said one of Deadman's main goals was to get laid! Apparently it's his entire motivation behind his blindly helping Rama! The horny corpse!
Deadman then precedes to ride the Devil's Dive roller coaster with the devil's brother. Which is weird since Deadman is incorporeal and can't actually remain inside the car at all times. But since it's the devil's brother's roller coaster, I'll allow for it to be paranormal. Maybe Deadman can even lose his arms and feet on this thing.
This is what a male virgin says to a whore. Um, so I'm told!
While conversing with the Son of Morning, Deadman flashes back on the mysteries and questions raised by the events and worries of the people he's previously possessed. These scenes reminded me of a poem I wrote years ago. Luckily, I couldn't find the poem and long past the age where I deemed it necessary to commit to memory anything I ever wrote in verse so that I could impress people at parties I just met. But I did find an invitation to an English Major college graduation party from Mary Pascual (a girl I had a crush on in my Steinbeck class who also introduced me to Sailor Moon) where she describes the action of these Deadman pages much better than the poem I couldn't find:
Mary's Invite: "...some necessities (which are all just a futile attempt to escape the existential nature of the universe through a forced and basically useless structure meant to calm us with a false sense of purpose and security) that you must fulfill...."
(Oh, and Hi, Mary! in case you ever Google your name and end up here!)
Images of people looking for meaning. People feeling they have no free will. People making connections in the most miserable and random circumstances. People losing faith in their 'forced and useless structure'.
So they continue on the roller coaster...
So! It is paranormal! Or a colonoscopy!
while Deadman and the Son of Morning play a game of twenty questions for Deadman's soul. Incidentally, the title of this story is Twenty Questions. So this might be important!
And speaking of women from old college classes:
The game of 20 Questions (is it fitting that I'm going to transcribe a large portion of someone else's comic book on SOPA protest day?) [My comments in brackets.]:
D: Okay. What is the meaning of the universe?
SoM: It was a failed experiment abandoned by its creator. Next.
D: Is my existence predetermined?
SoM: In a three-dimensional universe, yes. Predetermination doesn't really apply once you move sideways in time. Next.
D: What is the point of life and death?
SoM: That depends on whether or not you are alive or dead. When you are alive, the point is to stay alive. When you are dead, it is to answer the question of why you were alive in the first place. Next. [I thought when you were dead, the point was to feed the worms.]
D: Okay. Why do bad things happen to good people?
SoM: Because they usually deserve it. Frustrated yet?
D: Very.
SoM: Then we're getting somewhere.
D: What is the nature of our relationship with god? [Which god?]
SoM: You're supposed to ride the rails and not ask difficult questions. God has earned the right to ignore you. [Insert Tebow joke here for those reading currently. Later readers insert name of other current pop culture person obsessed with praying.]
D: What is truth? [Is truth unchanging law? We both have truths. Are mine the same as yours?]
SoM: Truth is an abstract and evolving concept defined by the whim of the last person to form an opinion on the subject. [My friend Soy Rakelson from high school bought into this without that whole cynical viewpoint being presented here.]
D: What happens to us when we die?
SoM: Well, duh.
D: How must we act?
SoM: Decisively.
D: What is fate?
SoM: Think of it as a tapestry, rather similar to cheap linoleum, which is printed on the fabric of the space-time continuum. Your job is to tread on it until it tears, and then sew it up again with conscious thought.
D: Do my good or bad deeds matter if nobody knows about them?
SoM: Nope. Isn't this fun?
D: "Why"?
SoM: Why not?
D: You're enjoying this, aren't you?
SoM: Yes.
D: This is bull. All of the answers just raise more questions. You knew this was going to happen.
SoM: Score one more for predetermination. Of course I knew this was going to happen.
SoM: You see, Mister Brand, that is the whole point. The answers to the great mysteries of our predetermined universe are meaningless without context.
Oh, but that's enough. Deadman finds that Rama is herself looking to ask a question about existence. But she doesn't know what question to ask. She has the answers but not the context to make the answers meaningful. And finally, she confronts Deadman:
I like how she thinks 'an end to the MEANING of your existence' is a powerful threat. Bring it on, bitch! I've got none of that to lose!
No comments:
Post a Comment