That idea might actually be crazy enough to work! just freeze him and stop his heart. he normally revives right away and if hes cold enough [further] brain damage takes 10+ mins to start right?
im ready to laugh if they try alot of reasonable things and just circle back to using a defib while having him on ice and it works and he revives.
Except, if they do that and it works, we got 2 Ethans, the one they revive, and the one that popped up… which would probably be quite an interesting twist ^^
When he revives the old body just despawns so that should not happen. It either works and no reviving is done or there is no respawn.
But not knowing the exact rules of his power the conclusion in case he needs a revive is a bit tricky. Can’t really say if he lost his powers in that case or if the trigger is just dead brain rather than no heartbeat.
But the two Ethan result I don’t really see happening with how he respawned before
Hmm that could lead to some funny consequences … at some point the storage for corpses is full and the dead Ethans rise to cause a zombie apocalypse … i guess thats not how Ethan imagined his role in it 🙂
Well, he never respawned with a body that was actually only very briefly dead… I still easily can see a timing where it would work, actually. I mean, let’s be realistic here for one sec, this is totally unrealistic anyway, we are in the realms of superpowers here ^^ … If all the good sci-fi books, comics or shows and, more to the point for supes, Marvel, DC and the gang, have taught us anything in the last hundred years, it’s that in that realm, every crazy shit is possible, as long as it makes a good story… We’ll see… Read more »
The thing is that flatlining is dangerous in any case. It is unhealthy on the short term, is too easily unhealthy on the long term and revival is by no means a certainty. Besides that, the power is a bit unclear, but you can loosely put any game rules where you would need to respawn as his power. But in this case it could be like a cutscene, allowing him to get much closer to actually dying before allowing him to respawn. We can see it at work with him drawing blood and living very long, or getting a wound… Read more »
Gonfrask
6 months ago
Not a bad theory here…when does Ethan power snap? I mean, it is when his heart stops o brain dies lacking oxygen…A flat heartline can be obtained under safety conditions, the brain one not so much…
In my opinion it is dependent on circumstances. Specifically when a game would consider him dead. That is why he can respawn before bleeding out when getting a mortal wound, but if he’s trying to ‘donate’ blood it can take a long while before it kicks in. One is as if in combat, the other as if in a cutscene. That means his respawn is circumstantial and not perfect to pinpoint, as different games handle death differently. Even within games it changes based on circumstances.
They have tested his powers somewhat. Lots of it has only been referenced. Like the reason Ethan had a tracker in his body was because he was afraid of ‘the Prestige’ scenarios where he was a new incarnation and left bodies everywhere, so they wanted to track location. Scott used that for more understanding of Ethan’s powers. But the blood draining was also to see when things of his body would respawn with him, besides Ethan’s wish to use it for a quick buck. So some of it has been used before.
He’s always respawned well before brain death, my guess its its tied to his heartbeat. That’s much more of a “Media” metric for death and his power is media based. It would take 4-5 minutes for the brain to stop all electrical function after say a piece of glass to the throat, or being cut in half by an arrow. Medically, death is much sloppier then they every show on TV or video games. Shoot a guy in the heart, and they DON’T just fall over dead.
JozMk.II
6 months ago
Prediction: Something urgent will pull Lucas into discontinuing this “vacation” and acting as D-Pad to intervene, despite knowing how much it will kill Ethan that he can’t join in. Ethan will end up joining in as Analog anyway and trailing D-Pad to the scene of urgency, despite not knowing for certain whether he still has his respawn ability. The urgent matter will likely involve Zeke, or perhaps Lilah; Someone Ethan cares about enough to put his possibly unrespawnable life on the line. Ethan will end up dying protecting Zeke/Lilah, after which he will in fact respawn. But the respawn may… Read more »
Either that that or Tim will pull a Dan Harmon moment, and go for something completely different, like in Rick and Morty. Remember the train episode? That was his way of telling the viewers stop expecting stuff, this is all already figured out. Your prediction seems incredibly logical, following storytelling guide, but, as you said, we should wait and see.
Still, I reeeaaally want Zeke to make a comeback, one way or another.
Nah, I think the overarching story would need time for both Zeke and Lilah to become established as main characters in their proper relationships with Lucas, Scott, and especially Ethan, first. If my prediction turned out to be true, only the foundation for one of those characters becoming a regular would have begun.
Arcatus
6 months ago
There is this thing with the green goo, and we, the readers know about it. But is that substance known to Ethan or Lucas? Dr Ted? The Autorites?
Ethan and Lucas did get splashed with the stuff, but do they remember that?
I’d assume they characters do remember, given how it was one of the most significant events of their lives.
It’s less clear if they know exactly what the stuff was and what it did. (Neither do we.)
And even if someone did trace its origin, it wasn’t as simple as just the goo giving them powers. It was goo plus freak lightning randomly channeled through an (inadequately wired?) arcade machine. Not exactly predictable or easily replicable results.
Paula
6 months ago
Why not Julia?
Mallengar
6 months ago
I hate to admit it but I was thinking of a flatliners for him as well. Just don’t know how he would go about doing that without hiring some black market doctor or revealing his identity
Alex Pendragon
6 months ago
You know, Ethan and Lucas got their powers from the same source. What if they stab Lucas with that compound stuff and see if his powers go away since his are easy to troubleshoot.
As has been stated, they don’t have much left. Also the Troll stated that he had used Ethan’s DNA to create the ‘cure’ for his super powers. Thus, its logical to assume that it’d have no effect on any other super hero, because it was tailored to Ethan’s DNA.
How useful could that be, assuming you’d have enough stuff for it? There’s basically possible outcomes:
Lucas doesn’t lose his powers – Doesn’t prove anything, as the ‘cure’ could be tailored to Ethan DNA/power specifically. Still stuck on guessing/worrying whether it worked on Ethan.
Lucas loses his powers –
Good news, you now know it worked. Still seems a bit much to cripple Lucas just to get back to the ‘(re) learn to live without powers’ situation you were already in.
21stCenturyPeon
6 months ago
It has to be Kevin Bacon, because if Flatliners-Kevin can’t revive Ethan, then at least he can still communicate with Stir-Of-Echoes-Kevin.
Jim Sorenson
6 months ago
Flatliners? With Kevin Bacon bringing back the dead, I thought he was talking about RIPD!
Wilku
6 months ago
What chances we have for Ethan developing another superpower if it turns out to be the same chemical compound Troll was in it?
Something like he planned to inject Ethan with it in hopes he would eventually die for real, trolling him for a bit for lulz and to induce paranoia in him, but it would eventually result in another gaming-related superpower?
foducool
6 months ago
“LIFE HAS NO MEANING ANYMORE!!!”
*jumps from roof*
*15 seconds later*
“hey guys, guess what?”
Lucas
6 months ago
Or Jason Isaacs from the OA.
Advocate
6 months ago
So a way to test Ethan’s power just occurred to me. If you think about it, Ethan actually has two powers technically: the ability to ‘respawn’ or ‘continue’, but that power is useless without the ability to “save.” Rationale: the blood incident. When Ethan was trying to donate blood, he discovered his body ‘loads’ its last healthy state. In order for his respawn power to not despawn the blood, he ‘saved’ somewhere between bloodletting and his next death, so the blood remained. “Save game” “Load game”. When you die, it’s game over and you can choose a save to load… Read more »
drc
6 months ago
He only has to convince the journalist that he is no longer a hero…
El_
6 months ago
The idea isn’t the -worst- Ethan has ever had. But at this point, I feel they may need to call in the bigger powers and get their help. If there’s a ‘cure’ out there, it benefits them to know all about it too.
Bloof
6 months ago
I like this idea. It’s probably not very good for you, but I might do it for infinite 1 ups.
Ste
6 months ago
Tim, in case you aren’t already aware, I can see the content of two “patron only” test posts in the RSS feed.
(Following the link in them correctly goes to a nothing to see here type page)
24
That idea might actually be crazy enough to work! just freeze him and stop his heart. he normally revives right away and if hes cold enough [further] brain damage takes 10+ mins to start right?
im ready to laugh if they try alot of reasonable things and just circle back to using a defib while having him on ice and it works and he revives.
Except, if they do that and it works, we got 2 Ethans, the one they revive, and the one that popped up… which would probably be quite an interesting twist ^^
When he revives the old body just despawns so that should not happen. It either works and no reviving is done or there is no respawn.
But not knowing the exact rules of his power the conclusion in case he needs a revive is a bit tricky. Can’t really say if he lost his powers in that case or if the trigger is just dead brain rather than no heartbeat.
But the two Ethan result I don’t really see happening with how he respawned before
Very unlikey, i mean, where would Ethan have disposed of 10.000 dead clones of himself at this point ?
This got me thinking of The Prestige.
Somewhere out there is a field full of copies of Ethan’s corpses.
Hmm that could lead to some funny consequences … at some point the storage for corpses is full and the dead Ethans rise to cause a zombie apocalypse … i guess thats not how Ethan imagined his role in it 🙂
It was stated in an earlier strip that there being a bunker or lab full of dead Ethans is one of his biggest fears
Maybe Ethan should reach out to The Spiffing Brit? If there’s a human that can find an exploit in something… j/k ?
Dont think that Ethan is a tea enjoyer 🙂
Well, he never respawned with a body that was actually only very briefly dead… I still easily can see a timing where it would work, actually. I mean, let’s be realistic here for one sec, this is totally unrealistic anyway, we are in the realms of superpowers here ^^ … If all the good sci-fi books, comics or shows and, more to the point for supes, Marvel, DC and the gang, have taught us anything in the last hundred years, it’s that in that realm, every crazy shit is possible, as long as it makes a good story… We’ll see… Read more »
What if that is the Troll’s plan all along, vis a vis “The Prestige”.
Image the Mind-F*** to Ethan (and quite frankly everyone else) of dozens/hundreds/etc. Ethans running around.
Which one is the “real” Ethan?
The thing is that flatlining is dangerous in any case. It is unhealthy on the short term, is too easily unhealthy on the long term and revival is by no means a certainty. Besides that, the power is a bit unclear, but you can loosely put any game rules where you would need to respawn as his power. But in this case it could be like a cutscene, allowing him to get much closer to actually dying before allowing him to respawn. We can see it at work with him drawing blood and living very long, or getting a wound… Read more »
Not a bad theory here…when does Ethan power snap? I mean, it is when his heart stops o brain dies lacking oxygen…A flat heartline can be obtained under safety conditions, the brain one not so much…
In my opinion it is dependent on circumstances. Specifically when a game would consider him dead. That is why he can respawn before bleeding out when getting a mortal wound, but if he’s trying to ‘donate’ blood it can take a long while before it kicks in. One is as if in combat, the other as if in a cutscene. That means his respawn is circumstantial and not perfect to pinpoint, as different games handle death differently. Even within games it changes based on circumstances.
Didn’t Ethan test his powers at some point? I wonder if anything he discovered back then will come into play.
They have tested his powers somewhat. Lots of it has only been referenced. Like the reason Ethan had a tracker in his body was because he was afraid of ‘the Prestige’ scenarios where he was a new incarnation and left bodies everywhere, so they wanted to track location. Scott used that for more understanding of Ethan’s powers. But the blood draining was also to see when things of his body would respawn with him, besides Ethan’s wish to use it for a quick buck. So some of it has been used before.
He’s always respawned well before brain death, my guess its its tied to his heartbeat. That’s much more of a “Media” metric for death and his power is media based. It would take 4-5 minutes for the brain to stop all electrical function after say a piece of glass to the throat, or being cut in half by an arrow. Medically, death is much sloppier then they every show on TV or video games. Shoot a guy in the heart, and they DON’T just fall over dead.
Prediction: Something urgent will pull Lucas into discontinuing this “vacation” and acting as D-Pad to intervene, despite knowing how much it will kill Ethan that he can’t join in. Ethan will end up joining in as Analog anyway and trailing D-Pad to the scene of urgency, despite not knowing for certain whether he still has his respawn ability. The urgent matter will likely involve Zeke, or perhaps Lilah; Someone Ethan cares about enough to put his possibly unrespawnable life on the line. Ethan will end up dying protecting Zeke/Lilah, after which he will in fact respawn. But the respawn may… Read more »
Either that that or Tim will pull a Dan Harmon moment, and go for something completely different, like in Rick and Morty. Remember the train episode? That was his way of telling the viewers stop expecting stuff, this is all already figured out. Your prediction seems incredibly logical, following storytelling guide, but, as you said, we should wait and see.
Still, I reeeaaally want Zeke to make a comeback, one way or another.
Plot twist: The same thing happens but Ethan doesn’t respawn.
Introducing CAD 3.0!
Nah, I think the overarching story would need time for both Zeke and Lilah to become established as main characters in their proper relationships with Lucas, Scott, and especially Ethan, first. If my prediction turned out to be true, only the foundation for one of those characters becoming a regular would have begun.
There is this thing with the green goo, and we, the readers know about it. But is that substance known to Ethan or Lucas? Dr Ted? The Autorites?
Ethan and Lucas did get splashed with the stuff, but do they remember that?
I’d assume they characters do remember, given how it was one of the most significant events of their lives.
It’s less clear if they know exactly what the stuff was and what it did. (Neither do we.)
And even if someone did trace its origin, it wasn’t as simple as just the goo giving them powers. It was goo plus freak lightning randomly channeled through an (inadequately wired?) arcade machine. Not exactly predictable or easily replicable results.
Why not Julia?
I hate to admit it but I was thinking of a flatliners for him as well. Just don’t know how he would go about doing that without hiring some black market doctor or revealing his identity
You know, Ethan and Lucas got their powers from the same source. What if they stab Lucas with that compound stuff and see if his powers go away since his are easy to troubleshoot.
They only have a few drops.
As has been stated, they don’t have much left. Also the Troll stated that he had used Ethan’s DNA to create the ‘cure’ for his super powers. Thus, its logical to assume that it’d have no effect on any other super hero, because it was tailored to Ethan’s DNA.
How useful could that be, assuming you’d have enough stuff for it? There’s basically possible outcomes:
Lucas doesn’t lose his powers – Doesn’t prove anything, as the ‘cure’ could be tailored to Ethan DNA/power specifically. Still stuck on guessing/worrying whether it worked on Ethan.
Lucas loses his powers –
Good news, you now know it worked. Still seems a bit much to cripple Lucas just to get back to the ‘(re) learn to live without powers’ situation you were already in.
It has to be Kevin Bacon, because if Flatliners-Kevin can’t revive Ethan, then at least he can still communicate with Stir-Of-Echoes-Kevin.
Flatliners? With Kevin Bacon bringing back the dead, I thought he was talking about RIPD!
What chances we have for Ethan developing another superpower if it turns out to be the same chemical compound Troll was in it?
Something like he planned to inject Ethan with it in hopes he would eventually die for real, trolling him for a bit for lulz and to induce paranoia in him, but it would eventually result in another gaming-related superpower?
“LIFE HAS NO MEANING ANYMORE!!!”
*jumps from roof*
*15 seconds later*
“hey guys, guess what?”
Or Jason Isaacs from the OA.
So a way to test Ethan’s power just occurred to me. If you think about it, Ethan actually has two powers technically: the ability to ‘respawn’ or ‘continue’, but that power is useless without the ability to “save.” Rationale: the blood incident. When Ethan was trying to donate blood, he discovered his body ‘loads’ its last healthy state. In order for his respawn power to not despawn the blood, he ‘saved’ somewhere between bloodletting and his next death, so the blood remained. “Save game” “Load game”. When you die, it’s game over and you can choose a save to load… Read more »
He only has to convince the journalist that he is no longer a hero…
The idea isn’t the -worst- Ethan has ever had. But at this point, I feel they may need to call in the bigger powers and get their help. If there’s a ‘cure’ out there, it benefits them to know all about it too.
I like this idea. It’s probably not very good for you, but I might do it for infinite 1 ups.
Tim, in case you aren’t already aware, I can see the content of two “patron only” test posts in the RSS feed.
(Following the link in them correctly goes to a nothing to see here type page)