Mind Control Comics Forum

Tuesday, December 22nd.

(http://cnt1.dvvent.com/dvv/open/mcc/sji/promos/sji-i359.jpg)

The who in the what now?  The hairstyle and the glasses could be Marli, but the (menacing?) shell glow throws everything into confusion.  If that isn't Marli, I have no idea who it actually is.  But the atmosphere makes her look quite different.  New shooter? ???

I call flashback to freshman orientation at Wilmot during Jakob's tenure as a teacher there.

If so, maybe that isn't Mallory, though she did study at Wilmot before her Master's work elsewhere.  Or am I misremembering bio details again?

That definitely isn't Marliese, I dunno what you guys are on about.

It's may be Rain or Cherry
Katie
it's hard to tell with the red glow

I think the only named characters we've seen wearing glasses (not shades) are Mallory, Arielle, and Zenon. If it's 1982 then Zenon's a strong contender.

I guess it's either a bit of history like the Halloween page with Mallory and her sister or an illustration of the tale Johannes is telling Caitlyn.

sorry I may need to add that it can be safety glass
he teaching a lab class

Danielle was use one, in make the watch
look back pages it's not the same glass

lady  in the library

They don't look like very safe safety glasses. And they appear to be magnifying her eyes quite a lot. But maybe.

I'm hoping her name's Velma.


It's true (and true to life) that both of Mallory's assistants in the library wear glasses but we don't know their names.


Maybe there's just a TV on in the background of one of the panels and this is on it. They do watch a lot of TV in SJI.

I conflated our literate lovers in almost IMPOSSIBLE gaffe.  I meant Mallory, though this looks most like one of her (so far) unnamed assistants.

Entire cast of SJI, in chorus: "I don't even own a TV!"

I love the proportions on the new girl.

I wonder who she's related to ;-)

so teach a class for two year.

So...WHAT???!!!!  :o

Jakob's narrating now?  From where?  To whom?  How reliably?

Based on this info, he might have just caught Pat and Miel's senior year (or just missed teaching them if they were transfer students).  But, if he's telling the truth, he probably missed the active phase of Operation Happy College.

Also, he looks 38 at the YOUNGEST in this flash back.  25 years layer, he's north of 60.

ETA--First guess on the redhead is that she's one of Mallory's aunts or older cousins.

if they did four year of collage be the class of 1987
you are right Jr. and senior if was first or second year Teaching

I figured this lecture was Fall of '86.  Their senior year.

Also, he's teaching Intro courses.  Unless Pat & Miel took a very Animal House or Van Wilder approach to college, they'd have been unlikely to enroll in one of his courses.

Sadly this means they won't recognize Jakob from his stint in Lazy Town.

*Titter*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-6RmCvCaEQ, 01:58.

Breadth requirement.

Sorry, that exchange totally missed me, particularly the clip.*shrugs*

Man, doesn't anyone read the title text for these things anymore?

Orientation?  And it's relevant to Superior Duck because Daffy has none? ???  It's late here.

ETA--Yes, Jakob's '80s self does look like an aged version of Robbie Rotten (at least that I get with a couple clicks of investigation).

Why do you think it's Jakob narrating? Just because he has the only speaking part in #359?

#357 ends with Jakob's brother about spill the beans about him. And #358 ends with his lawyer Ezra, Jacqui's ex, about to do the same. I think it's much more likely that one of them is 'talking' here as the narrator. Most likely it's the latter, that Ezra is the narrator. If Johannes had been teaching at Wilmot at the same time as his brother, I think he would have mentioned it when he said Jakob taught there.

Assuming the narrator is Ezra, perhaps that's where he first meet Jakob? When they were both teaching at Wilmot?

Wait, WHAT?! ??? ??? :o :o

The speaking part in 359 IS narration. >:(  Jakob's narrating this portion about his own life either to someone or for his own twisted memoirs.  But to whom, and how reliably?  "I did such and such," and the illustration is Jakob doing that.  Last name of the dark-haired, going gray prof. is Kuppler.  Johannes (the only other Kuppler brother that we know of) is blond!!  If Ezra Cantor taught a couple semesters of engineering at Wilmot under the name "Kuppler," then he has more serious problems than I originally thought.  Plus, his face is lined differently than the flashback prof.

Which is why "trouble with narrators" is an excellent pop-up text.

Note, pop-up text is not visible on, say, smartphones.   So, if someone is away from his or her computer for any reason when viewing the comic, the wit or the song lyrics will just never appear.  Sorry.

ETA--Oh, and I didn't assume Fall '86, or divine it because I have spectacular instincts.  It's right there on the board behind Jakob's head.

Double ETA--Obviously, I'm not focusing well.  I keep messing up character names.  More after a rest.

The only thing we know Jakob 'says' in that 359 is "hello" The rest is in narration boxes, and could be someone else talking about their time teaching EE @ Wilmot. The last thing Ezra says in 358 is 'tell me what you need to know' (talking about Jakob). And a lot of IP lawyers start as tech people before they sell their souls. :-)

I just read 358 and 359 consecutively, and the narration seemed like Ezra's intro to telling his how I met Jacob story. Maybe I'm just crazy? :-)

I got the "narrators" thing from the pop-up text, and the source from googling. (Looking at the clip I'm amazed anyone figured out what Daffy Duck said let alone made note of it. Obviously I don't watch enough kids' TV...) I have to say I was thinking it was Johannes speaking; Ezra didn't occur to me. Although, in the circumstances, I'm surprised either of them would mention "the obvious appeal of the student body."

If it's Ezra talking about meeting Jakob for the first time then presumably that means Ezra's two semesters overlapped with Jakob being at Wilmot. But of course then all this page tells us about timing is that Jakob was there in late '86. Jakob might have been there from 1980 to 2011 for all we know. The person talking was only there for two semesters, but actually we don't know when those were.

But if we assume that Ezra was there lecturing on electrical engineering in late '86... Well, if Ezra is Miriam's father then that happened in early '89. And the assumption has been that he met Jacqui in his capacity as a New York entertainment lawyer, rather than as the guy who fixed her mandolin tuner.

I'm not saying that tells us anything; I'm just trying to piece together the timing of the thing.

80s Jakob doesn't look as though he's definitely 38 or older.
I don't see any gray in his hair; I see blue "highlights" that maybe show us how dark black his hair was then.

Blue to sky-blue/white which always trips me up. To me, either it's a punk afficianado obsessed with Cookie Monster (or possibly Ally Sheedy), or it's someone with hair that looks to be prematurely graying.  I'm not good with that particular cue.

Yes, Pearl and Jacqui have a little blue in the raven of their hair, but this is extreme, and it has tripped me up with them too.

With regard to the narration--this has to be Jakob telling this story at the moment.  He's telling the story, and we're seeing an illustration of his time there (which may or may not partially contradict what he's saying).

For the sake of argument, why would a music major or an art major need "Intro to Electrical Engineering" as a survey requirement during their senior year?  ???

ETA--The title doesn't point to or elucidate the pop-up text, which is what I missed and what our fearless author was pointing back at with the Loony Toons clip.

Double ETA--Yes, a lot of IP lawyers start out as or go back to teaching to soothe their consciences or get away from the grind.  However, they typically teach law at law schools, not electrical engineering.  Plus, '86 would have been smack in the middle of Ezra's young turk wild child phase.  He represented bands, and typically attended the concerts of the bands he represented with backstage access.  That's how he and Jacqui met.  It's how Pearl exists!!  He took a break from the '80s rock scene to teach electrical engineering, a subject in which he has no known background?  Really?  Even if he were aware of project Happy College, if his clients included hair bands, he wouldn't have had to go searching for interesting opportunities.  It was just "around" and with his privileged access to the bands and the money he could throw around, he could have had probably as much fun as he wanted on the road.  So, he doesn't need the money or the fun.  He doesn't have a background in this subject matter.  He'd end up in that classroom...how, exactly?

You've already asked this and Daphne said, "Breadth requirement."

And, you know, that was the heyday of keyboard synthesizers...

Y'know, that I'd believe more easily than just "breadth requirement."  Usually a science breadth requirement is biology or chemistry or geology.  Intro to Electrical Engineering is more for first year science majors to begin the process of sifting the wannabes from the diehards.

However, if Dyann Cannon could "convincingly" portray a soccer mom with a hit pop single in a 1989 TV movie, with her preteen son in her backup band playing whatever that vertical accordion-looking synthesizer is (I swear this is true), then Pat could definitely take an electrical engineering course to learn how to improve the tools of his trade.

I'm still not sold on the idea of Ezra and Jakob first crossing paths in an engineering faculty lounge (or staff meeting) in Wilmot.

Concerining the pop-up text--that particular pop-up function doesn't activate on smartphones (or it never has on mine).

Try tapping and holding the image. Works on iOS.

Nope!!!  Save, copy or print.  No pop-up. >:(

.

Yes, it is a bit of a stretch, but ...

• A pov from Jakob really makes no sense here, it's a complete non-sequitur, as I think you yourself pointed out. :-) Who's he telling the story to? Why? How are we privy to it?
• Johannes, who is also about to talk about Jakob in #357, is also a stretch ... I don't think it likely they were both teaching at Wilmot at the same time.
• It could be someone else entirely, but I then have no clue who it might be! And that seems like a waste of the two perfectly good lead-ins in #357 & #358.

But couldn't that be the point of the pop-up text?  With Cherry dead...or almost dead (she might be too pretty to kill just yet) this is our opposing perspective to Adrian and Rain.  This is Jakob's version of things.  Also, if he gets an opportunity to speak here, it's possible that he can Roger Akroyd over some secrets that Johannes and Ezra know (depriving the reader of crucial information for later) while providing us with some entertaining images of some things that perhaps neither his brother nor Ezra know, so that the audience is at a deficit, yet simultaneously privileged.

The "Good Soldier" narrative rope-a-dope.

ETA--something I should have mentioned earlier.  That seems like an astonishingly large class for Wilmot.  We know Wilmot's small because no one who goes or works there uses their car even in winter(if they even own one).  I'm amazed that his class as an adjunct for one division of an intro course is that large.

I'm getting the Save, Copy, Cancel and the pop up text as my choices. Thanks

Well, based on #360, I guess you're right. But a POV from Jacob here still seems more than a bit odd to me. :-)

I think the strangeness is part of the plan at the moment.