Yeah. I’m with Benny here.
While I love Selkie, I am fucking sick and tired of her belief she can charm or bulldoze her way through every situation. Benny’s annoying but I think he’s a potential breakout character and I suspected his origin from the start and I really want to see him come into his own. I really do.
Benny could have just not agreed to her deal. He is older than her and should know better. But he wants to be a little shit and will probably try to play the victim like she forced him to tell her.
Say, were we ever told what happened to the humans who did that? Could they be charged with a crime, given that sarnothi weren’t legally recognized at the time?
Honestly I have wondered about that from time to time what did happen to the fisherman, they committed murder and it sounds like Benny’s dad died horribly.
So what did happen to those fishermen, even though sarnothis weren’t legally recognized at the time that was still a humanoid person with a language and feelings, honestly I hope in the next page it’s answered.
Probably they were given a Major Talking To by the government and told to just never tell anyone ever.
You can’t punish someone for killing a creature that isn’t a *person* according to law. Odds are the most they get would be some kind of poaching charge.
it’s completely unbelievable to me. Probably the worst “plot point” in this entire comic. Not a single rational being can believe this unless the details are all wrong on purpose.
You’d be surprised how much people see what they think they should see.
The fisherman probably dredge up unintended sea creatures in the catch a lot. So, when they caught Benny’s father, it’s not hard to imagine they saw what they had always seen before—a strange sea creature. In the dim light of the crepuscular hours typical of fishermen’s work, maybe they only noticed gills and webs among the many fish in the net. Maybe they couldn’t hear his voice over the horns and waves and hollering on the rig. Maybe by the time the sun had come up and they could see their mistake, it was too late…
Or maybe the “didn’t realize he was a person” explanation is just a cover story for a much worse truth.
Sounds like that matter in particular would’ve been one of the main disagreements between Jin Sorai and Sar Teri. Wouldn’t be surprised if someone even tried tracking them down on the surface in order to “bring them to justice”.
I’ll leave it for each on their own to imagine what kind of “justice” that could mean in practice…
I LOVE how, not only does he not get promptly reprimanded for cussing at a 10 year old, but THATS her first question.
Clearly Avery makes for a good, balanced stepdad.
I think it is. Which got me to think about the whole swear censoring thing once again… I’m personally a big fan of both symbol swearing and swears cut short (e.g. with “Martha, swear jar!”). But there are occasions when even I can appeciate leaving the cencorship completely out, most of the time to emphasize the gravity of the situation, as was the chase here as well, I think.
I agree! This series is much better with the creative use of censorship (which opens it up to younger readers, and to more sensitive readers, while also not pretending that characters don’t ever swear), but there are times when a good f-bomb really makes a point and shouldn’t be diluted — or softend by the mild comedy that even the most creative censorship brings in.
Definitely. I’m one of those who finds swearing distasteful, and too much of it can actually pull me out of a work. From a writing standpoint, though, reserving it for important occasions helps improve the impact of both the word and the moment.
I expect this is going to lead to Benny spilling the beans about his jealousy over Selkie “having her dad” and he doesn’t so She’s SO Lucky…. Which leads to Selkie bristling up and going “Yeah, well at least YOU have YOUR MOM, I don’t!”
The broken car someone died in was more accurate a metaphor than Selkie probably expected.
…I mean, she was traded a backstory about a broken family someone died in, so I’m gonna call close enough (especially since they’re both underwater and also under-aged so neither of them could trade actual cars anyway).
Tbh Benny, while he had a very crappy history, seems entirely ungrateful to and angry at Avery. Like…he doesn’t even have a nice family-adjacent word for him? Who calls their guardians by their first names? And what guardian lets the kid do that?
Dude, that’s just normal teenage stepchildren. Unless the stepmom/stepdad came in early in life, it’s typucal for the step-parent to just be referred to and addressed by name.
Kids are individuals, regardless of species. Benny was old enough at the time of the ordeal to form opinions as well as being horribly traumatized by watching his dad get netted and filleted by human fishermen.
He’s got a lot of anger towards humans, and here his mother has gone and married one of them? The audacity! He seems to have some annoyance to mom, but mostly to Avery who I’m sure he believes used his position of power to woo his mother. ….Truth is, Avery, the agent assigned to their family, I’m sure, bonded with and affection grew between them, and his role as her new “husband” puts him in even more position to be their first protector.
But Benny, as a kid, can’t really see that. He just sees that “these people” are an enemy, and this one is now my “new dad” and I hate that, but I have to kind of be nice to him.
A lot of kids have anger towards a step-parent, if they have loyalty to the bio parent and this “new person” feels like an intruder in their life. My MIL’s step-children absolutely despised her during their marriage, and even now after their father has passed, despite being adults with their own children when MIL and her husband married and my MIL being the sweetest thing. Because they didn’t feel like their widower father “should be allowed to remarry” anyone else.
On the flip-side of that… my daughter has claimed her step-dad as her “real dad” because her bio dad was so abusive he completely lost parental rights. And step-dad came in when she was 13, as a friend who showed her utmost respect and supports who she is and wants to be, with no expectations of how she’s supposed to treat him. He is, whatever she decided he should be. And she chose for him to be Dad. He’ll be adopting her soon. My older 2 kids just call him by his name. and that’s fine.
I started calling my biological father by his first name because my step-siblings did so. He didn’t like it, but he couldn’t get me to stop. I liked it because I didn’t really consider the man a father.
My mother’s second husband and I got on well, but I was 6-7 when they married. My sister and I both called him by his first name, though when talking to my younger half-brother, I referred to him as “your dad” because I understood there was a respect aspect, and I didn’t want him to start calling his dad by first name because of us.
My mother’s third husband came into my life when I was in my 20s. I graduated college a few years before they were married. That man is Dad. He’s in my phone as Dad. I call him Dad when I speak to him and seek out his opinions and advice as I would a father (though that sometimes means I have to clarify for people who know my biological father was a piece of work and are confused when I speak fondly of “my parents”).
As a parent? I’m okay with younger kids calling me as “Miss Nickname.” One of my daughter’s friends called me by my full first name, which was a little weird to me just because I wasn’t used to hearing it. She’s started using the nickname now, though, and it just -fits- so much better than calling me “Mrs. LastName.” For our own kid, well, she uses both. When we play videogames with our now first-grader, we usually use our names instead of our online screennames for our characters. So while she calls us “Mama” and “Daddy” in day-to-day life, when we play games, she likes to call us by our names because that’s what she sees on screen. Which is honestly fine? It’s just a name in a game, and it helps reinforce to her what our names are. It doesn’t change the level of respect she has for us or anything.
I have a feeling this is going to go the way of “you have your dad” vs. “My mom didn’t even want me and my dad is denying he is my dad”
both so heartbreaking.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Benny hates most humans, and if that is why Avery gives him a fairly large leeway. Avery represents the people who murdered his father, and Benny has to look at his father’s murderer (figuratively) every single day. I can’t even imagine how much counseling he needs. Poor child.
theres also the real gravitas that his dad was straight up murdered by the fishermen. when you think of it, what do they mean by ‘processed’. the fact that even if there was a language barrier, he could have been, and *SHOULD* have been removed from the net, but wasnt for WHATEVER reason. to him, humans just straight up proved their stupidity. he’s having a hard time accepting her mom marrying this *human* for whatever amount of time its been (hell, my own sister spent 8 years trying to get our parents back together after their divorce, and never liked it when our mom tried to remarry or pursue romantic relationships)
and he’s obviously not in on a lot of the information regarding the possibility (though i think its been stated otherwise) that scar is her dad, she cant just walk up to him and call him such for many, many reasons. we also have that a HUMAN is raising her rather than a sarnothi family, and that she is WILDLY ignorant of a lot of her own culture. i can imagine this is yet, one of MANY sore spots in Benny atm
Yeah. I’m with Benny here.
While I love Selkie, I am fucking sick and tired of her belief she can charm or bulldoze her way through every situation. Benny’s annoying but I think he’s a potential breakout character and I suspected his origin from the start and I really want to see him come into his own. I really do.
Benny could have just not agreed to her deal. He is older than her and should know better. But he wants to be a little shit and will probably try to play the victim like she forced him to tell her.
Just because Benny is older than her that doesn’t change the fact that he is ALSO still a child.
Agreed. How do you learn about social interaction if your mistakes aren’t checked? Benny’s amazingly resilient here.
To borrow the “charming” human expression, they gutted him like a fish. Literally.
Say, were we ever told what happened to the humans who did that? Could they be charged with a crime, given that sarnothi weren’t legally recognized at the time?
Won’t bring him back, I realize, but…
Honestly I have wondered about that from time to time what did happen to the fisherman, they committed murder and it sounds like Benny’s dad died horribly.
So what did happen to those fishermen, even though sarnothis weren’t legally recognized at the time that was still a humanoid person with a language and feelings, honestly I hope in the next page it’s answered.
Probably they were given a Major Talking To by the government and told to just never tell anyone ever.
You can’t punish someone for killing a creature that isn’t a *person* according to law. Odds are the most they get would be some kind of poaching charge.
it’s completely unbelievable to me. Probably the worst “plot point” in this entire comic. Not a single rational being can believe this unless the details are all wrong on purpose.
You’d be surprised how much people see what they think they should see.
The fisherman probably dredge up unintended sea creatures in the catch a lot. So, when they caught Benny’s father, it’s not hard to imagine they saw what they had always seen before—a strange sea creature. In the dim light of the crepuscular hours typical of fishermen’s work, maybe they only noticed gills and webs among the many fish in the net. Maybe they couldn’t hear his voice over the horns and waves and hollering on the rig. Maybe by the time the sun had come up and they could see their mistake, it was too late…
Or maybe the “didn’t realize he was a person” explanation is just a cover story for a much worse truth.
Sounds like that matter in particular would’ve been one of the main disagreements between Jin Sorai and Sar Teri. Wouldn’t be surprised if someone even tried tracking them down on the surface in order to “bring them to justice”.
I’ll leave it for each on their own to imagine what kind of “justice” that could mean in practice…
To quote the Canadian army: “It’s not a war crime the first time.”
To be fair to Benny, that is much better than him flat out saying Scar is her bio-dad.
Also a great way to de-rail uncomfortable conversations.
I LOVE how, not only does he not get promptly reprimanded for cussing at a 10 year old, but THATS her first question.
Clearly Avery makes for a good, balanced stepdad.
Is this our first uncensored swear?
I don’t believe so, but I can’t remember the last time we got one. It’s happened a couple times, but rarely, I think.
I think it is. Which got me to think about the whole swear censoring thing once again… I’m personally a big fan of both symbol swearing and swears cut short (e.g. with “Martha, swear jar!”). But there are occasions when even I can appeciate leaving the cencorship completely out, most of the time to emphasize the gravity of the situation, as was the chase here as well, I think.
I agree! This series is much better with the creative use of censorship (which opens it up to younger readers, and to more sensitive readers, while also not pretending that characters don’t ever swear), but there are times when a good f-bomb really makes a point and shouldn’t be diluted — or softend by the mild comedy that even the most creative censorship brings in.
Definitely. I’m one of those who finds swearing distasteful, and too much of it can actually pull me out of a work. From a writing standpoint, though, reserving it for important occasions helps improve the impact of both the word and the moment.
No, comic/selkie35/ had the first uncensored swear, by Amanda.
Could have sworn I edited that after the fact. I remember thinking I didn’t want to go full South Park with the language. Welp.
I expect this is going to lead to Benny spilling the beans about his jealousy over Selkie “having her dad” and he doesn’t so She’s SO Lucky…. Which leads to Selkie bristling up and going “Yeah, well at least YOU have YOUR MOM, I don’t!”
Interesting…maybe its cause I dont have kids, but I assumed the reprimand was for “my dad was the murdered first contact” not for the swearing.
Sorry, this was supposed to be in reply to Kim further up 🙁
NP.
But as a parent myself… I interpreted it as reprimand for the whole matter. The F-bomb was just sprinkles on top of an even more serious deal.
Priorities, here! 😉
The broken car someone died in was more accurate a metaphor than Selkie probably expected.
…I mean, she was traded a backstory about a broken family someone died in, so I’m gonna call close enough (especially since they’re both underwater and also under-aged so neither of them could trade actual cars anyway).
Tbh Benny, while he had a very crappy history, seems entirely ungrateful to and angry at Avery. Like…he doesn’t even have a nice family-adjacent word for him? Who calls their guardians by their first names? And what guardian lets the kid do that?
I call my step dad by his first name, since I met him when I was 9 years old. I’m now 40, and still call him by his first name.
It’s a very normal thing to do.
Dude, that’s just normal teenage stepchildren. Unless the stepmom/stepdad came in early in life, it’s typucal for the step-parent to just be referred to and addressed by name.
Kids are individuals, regardless of species. Benny was old enough at the time of the ordeal to form opinions as well as being horribly traumatized by watching his dad get netted and filleted by human fishermen.
He’s got a lot of anger towards humans, and here his mother has gone and married one of them? The audacity! He seems to have some annoyance to mom, but mostly to Avery who I’m sure he believes used his position of power to woo his mother. ….Truth is, Avery, the agent assigned to their family, I’m sure, bonded with and affection grew between them, and his role as her new “husband” puts him in even more position to be their first protector.
But Benny, as a kid, can’t really see that. He just sees that “these people” are an enemy, and this one is now my “new dad” and I hate that, but I have to kind of be nice to him.
A lot of kids have anger towards a step-parent, if they have loyalty to the bio parent and this “new person” feels like an intruder in their life. My MIL’s step-children absolutely despised her during their marriage, and even now after their father has passed, despite being adults with their own children when MIL and her husband married and my MIL being the sweetest thing. Because they didn’t feel like their widower father “should be allowed to remarry” anyone else.
On the flip-side of that… my daughter has claimed her step-dad as her “real dad” because her bio dad was so abusive he completely lost parental rights. And step-dad came in when she was 13, as a friend who showed her utmost respect and supports who she is and wants to be, with no expectations of how she’s supposed to treat him. He is, whatever she decided he should be. And she chose for him to be Dad. He’ll be adopting her soon. My older 2 kids just call him by his name. and that’s fine.
I started calling my biological father by his first name because my step-siblings did so. He didn’t like it, but he couldn’t get me to stop. I liked it because I didn’t really consider the man a father.
My mother’s second husband and I got on well, but I was 6-7 when they married. My sister and I both called him by his first name, though when talking to my younger half-brother, I referred to him as “your dad” because I understood there was a respect aspect, and I didn’t want him to start calling his dad by first name because of us.
My mother’s third husband came into my life when I was in my 20s. I graduated college a few years before they were married. That man is Dad. He’s in my phone as Dad. I call him Dad when I speak to him and seek out his opinions and advice as I would a father (though that sometimes means I have to clarify for people who know my biological father was a piece of work and are confused when I speak fondly of “my parents”).
As a parent? I’m okay with younger kids calling me as “Miss Nickname.” One of my daughter’s friends called me by my full first name, which was a little weird to me just because I wasn’t used to hearing it. She’s started using the nickname now, though, and it just -fits- so much better than calling me “Mrs. LastName.” For our own kid, well, she uses both. When we play videogames with our now first-grader, we usually use our names instead of our online screennames for our characters. So while she calls us “Mama” and “Daddy” in day-to-day life, when we play games, she likes to call us by our names because that’s what she sees on screen. Which is honestly fine? It’s just a name in a game, and it helps reinforce to her what our names are. It doesn’t change the level of respect she has for us or anything.
I feel like uncensored swearing on a topic like this is completely fair. Id have responded the same way at that age.
There are certain times and topics where profanity is entirely appropriate.
Benny gets a pass here.
I have a feeling this is going to go the way of “you have your dad” vs. “My mom didn’t even want me and my dad is denying he is my dad”
both so heartbreaking.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Benny hates most humans, and if that is why Avery gives him a fairly large leeway. Avery represents the people who murdered his father, and Benny has to look at his father’s murderer (figuratively) every single day. I can’t even imagine how much counseling he needs. Poor child.
Benny at least likes humans enough to appreciate their video games.
theres also the real gravitas that his dad was straight up murdered by the fishermen. when you think of it, what do they mean by ‘processed’. the fact that even if there was a language barrier, he could have been, and *SHOULD* have been removed from the net, but wasnt for WHATEVER reason. to him, humans just straight up proved their stupidity. he’s having a hard time accepting her mom marrying this *human* for whatever amount of time its been (hell, my own sister spent 8 years trying to get our parents back together after their divorce, and never liked it when our mom tried to remarry or pursue romantic relationships)
and he’s obviously not in on a lot of the information regarding the possibility (though i think its been stated otherwise) that scar is her dad, she cant just walk up to him and call him such for many, many reasons. we also have that a HUMAN is raising her rather than a sarnothi family, and that she is WILDLY ignorant of a lot of her own culture. i can imagine this is yet, one of MANY sore spots in Benny atm