Full Transcript for "Deadly Class" by Rick Remender Issues 1-3 (Ep. 22)

TRANSCRIPT 🔗

WEBVTT 00:00:03.120 --> 00:00:04.240 Hey there everybody. 00:00:04.320 --> 00:00:06.400 Welcome back to another episode of Kickback Comics. 00:00:06.480 --> 00:00:07.519 My name is Antonio. 00:00:07.679 --> 00:00:11.039 My name is Ben, and y'all are listening to a comic book podcast. 00:00:11.439 --> 00:00:20.399 By two guys who have not read a lot of comics but are looking to get involved, read some cool stories, maybe become part of a school for deadly assassins. 00:00:20.640 --> 00:00:21.039 I don't know. 00:00:21.199 --> 00:00:22.640 Maybe something about the president. 00:00:22.800 --> 00:00:23.600 We'll talk about it. 00:00:23.760 --> 00:00:24.160 Yep. 00:00:24.399 --> 00:00:26.719 We are murdering people this episode. 00:00:27.039 --> 00:00:28.399 That is what we're doing. 00:00:28.559 --> 00:00:29.679 So hang on. 00:00:29.760 --> 00:00:29.920 Yeah. 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:30.960 We're doing a book club. 00:00:31.039 --> 00:00:32.320 Thank you guys so much for joining us. 00:00:32.560 --> 00:00:33.200 Yeah, thank you. 00:00:33.439 --> 00:00:37.359 Uh this week we read the first three issues of Deadly Class. 00:00:37.679 --> 00:00:38.880 Deadly Class, bro. 00:00:38.960 --> 00:00:41.359 This is, and this is one that's been on the docket for a little while. 00:00:41.439 --> 00:00:44.799 Like, but I think before we even started doing this, you were talking about doing this. 00:00:45.039 --> 00:00:45.280 Yeah. 00:00:45.520 --> 00:00:57.679 The the backstory um like reading history for me is I read the first, yeah, I read the first, I think, six issues a couple years ago and just went, okay, this book is so cool. 00:00:57.759 --> 00:00:59.679 Like I think I read it on my iPad or something. 00:00:59.920 --> 00:01:03.119 I was like, okay, when I see the opportunity to buy it, I'm I'm gonna buy all of it. 00:01:04.239 --> 00:01:11.680 And then I saw, I'm holding for you podcasters, this huge ass coffee say coffee table book sized like collected edition. 00:01:11.920 --> 00:01:16.560 Um, and it has the first, let's see, how many it says? 00:01:16.799 --> 00:01:18.879 It's gonna be like what, 15 or something like that. 00:01:19.200 --> 00:01:19.760 It's pretty big. 00:01:20.000 --> 00:01:20.640 Yeah, it is. 00:01:20.719 --> 00:01:23.200 It's it's what it's the first one through 16 issues. 00:01:23.840 --> 00:01:29.599 And what's crazy though, too, is I got these so on sale at Comic-Con, I have the first three of these. 00:01:30.000 --> 00:01:30.400 Wow. 00:01:30.560 --> 00:01:31.519 So how long? 00:01:31.599 --> 00:01:32.560 How many issues of this are they? 00:01:32.799 --> 00:01:33.359 Each one is 16. 00:01:33.519 --> 00:01:35.200 So how many issues of Deadly Class are they? 00:01:35.359 --> 00:01:37.040 I think like so there's more than three. 00:01:37.120 --> 00:01:40.079 I have it's exactly 56 issues. 00:01:40.400 --> 00:01:41.200 56 issues. 00:01:41.439 --> 00:01:41.760 Yes. 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:43.680 That's more achievable than invincible. 00:01:43.840 --> 00:01:44.000 Yeah. 00:01:44.159 --> 00:01:49.840 But this is one of those that I think we'll we'll try to read, we'll read through um a good amount of it over time, probably. 00:01:50.239 --> 00:01:59.040 This has been this this was like a super fun read, and and and and we're doing, I guess, a couple less issues than we normally do trying something out, but I think that this is like it's a good, it's a good three. 00:01:59.200 --> 00:02:06.239 It gets us into the story, and it's gonna be exciting when we come back to it for the next for the next three or however many we end up doing for sure. 00:02:06.640 --> 00:02:11.439 Yeah, it's uh it's a really cool story, and let's just let's jump into some some context. 00:02:11.599 --> 00:02:24.000 The uh the creative team of Deadly Class, the writer is uh Rick Remender, the artist is Wes Craig, the color artist is Lee uh Lowridge, yeah, or Lowridge or something like that. 00:02:24.159 --> 00:02:26.719 Lowridge, regardless that shout out. 00:02:26.960 --> 00:02:28.319 Shout out to Lee. 00:02:28.479 --> 00:02:31.680 Uh the colors in this book are incredible. 00:02:31.919 --> 00:02:32.639 Yeah, super fun. 00:02:32.800 --> 00:02:36.400 And then letterer is uh Russ Wooten, who we've been seen before. 00:02:36.639 --> 00:02:37.759 We're recognizing names here. 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:39.039 Yeah, this is feeling good. 00:02:39.280 --> 00:02:42.319 We're really we're becoming we're gonna have to change the intro at some point. 00:02:42.400 --> 00:02:46.080 We're gonna have to be saying like we read a reasonable amount of comics, but we haven't read them all. 00:02:46.319 --> 00:02:48.479 We're coming up on our first uh first year of recording. 00:02:48.560 --> 00:02:49.120 Yeah, honestly. 00:02:49.280 --> 00:02:50.960 That's gonna be like when we get to this fall. 00:02:51.039 --> 00:02:53.039 So pretty soon we're gonna be like we've got season two. 00:02:53.280 --> 00:02:54.159 Season two is gonna begin. 00:02:54.240 --> 00:02:56.319 We'll we'll talk about what all that means when we get there. 00:02:56.400 --> 00:02:59.439 Yeah, we also need to have some conversations about what that means. 00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:00.719 But it means something. 00:03:00.800 --> 00:03:01.439 That's all you gotta know. 00:03:01.759 --> 00:03:02.479 But season two, yeah. 00:03:02.560 --> 00:03:03.520 Get ready for season two. 00:03:03.680 --> 00:03:04.400 You guys are not ready. 00:03:04.639 --> 00:03:05.520 Yeah, you're not ready. 00:03:05.680 --> 00:03:07.919 We're we're not ready yet, but you're also not ready to be. 00:03:08.080 --> 00:03:09.120 We're all gonna get ready together. 00:03:09.280 --> 00:03:11.599 We're gonna find what it means to be ready. 00:03:11.840 --> 00:03:12.639 It's gonna be super good. 00:03:12.719 --> 00:03:14.240 But they they all went crazy on this. 00:03:14.319 --> 00:03:16.000 I'm I'm having I'm having a great time reading this. 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:26.800 I think it's just kind

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of like a I mean, just off these first couple of issues, it's I mean, it's kind of messed up to say in a way, because of how morbid a lot of the stuff is, but it's it's just a good story, I think for sure. 00:03:26.960 --> 00:03:45.120 And I think it's I think it's just fun in the sense that like I I don't know, I have a lot of fun with these types of things where it's like you I don't know, you it's kind of like uh it's a little bit darker, but it gives me kind of like some like Naruto vibes of like, you know, cool disenfranchised kid who's like coming up. 00:03:45.199 --> 00:03:55.360 He's I mean Naruto is way less about like I guess like revenge in the sense of like negativity, but it's like trying to prove something, coming up going up against um these systems that have like held you down, whatever else. 00:03:55.520 --> 00:03:57.360 That's always my kind of classic throwback one there. 00:03:57.439 --> 00:04:00.800 And we also talked about um Catcher in the Rye, too. 00:04:00.879 --> 00:04:10.960 That's like another I did not I do not remember enough of that, but I think that there were definitely some kind of parallels of just like this uh these disenfranchised kids, right, that are living in this world. 00:04:11.199 --> 00:04:14.719 Yeah, this story definitely has a very intense tone. 00:04:14.879 --> 00:04:14.960 Yeah. 00:04:15.120 --> 00:04:18.160 It's kind of edgy, uh non like non-apologetic. 00:04:18.319 --> 00:04:27.279 I'd say it I don't know if this analogy works for everybody, but to me, it feels like how Tarantino movies feel to me. 00:04:27.600 --> 00:04:41.680 Where part of part of what the value is is this just kind of raw shock value, violent, um, you know, I I just said unapologetic, but yeah, you know, there it's sort of boundary pushing some some stuff, you know. 00:04:42.000 --> 00:04:42.160 Right. 00:04:42.240 --> 00:05:02.879 I think I think that you know one of the things that we have even I think touched on before before jumping on the pod today was that like you know, you can and I think that probably even in a couple of um the forewords and things like that talk about like the the again the word that you use, unapologetic, which I think is kind of the perfect thing for this, but it's like we're getting the author, I think, pretty obviously in this story, right? 00:05:02.959 --> 00:05:14.160 It's like there are obviously things that are, you know, um for the story, but I feel like we're getting a lot of um there's feelings, there's opinions, there's whatever else that is that is seeping through, I think, a lot of what goes on in this story. 00:05:14.240 --> 00:05:16.800 Um and personal experiences too, right? 00:05:16.959 --> 00:05:19.920 So but this is gonna be a good one. 00:05:20.079 --> 00:05:24.639 Um this is also we're back at I can't remember if you mentioned this already, but we're back at image, bro. 00:05:24.879 --> 00:05:27.439 Image, they really do be releasing a lot of bangers. 00:05:27.519 --> 00:05:27.920 I don't know. 00:05:28.000 --> 00:05:31.120 It's it's tough to get away from them, I feel like, because they're just so good. 00:05:31.439 --> 00:05:36.000 Yeah, I mean the the medium of comics is vast as we've been learning. 00:05:36.160 --> 00:05:36.480 Yes. 00:05:36.639 --> 00:05:52.079 And Marvel and Marvel and you know, Iron Man and Batman are a narrow sliver of what comics have to it's like all of what we think of in the collective consciousness, and as far as the cool storytelling goes, it's just of just a piece of the puzzle. 00:05:52.240 --> 00:05:56.000 Yeah, it's it's like the tip of the tip of the tip of the iceberg, yeah, is what we're really seeing. 00:05:56.240 --> 00:05:58.879 Which is and people like, oh you know, say, Oh yeah, I'm reading comics, that's great. 00:05:59.040 --> 00:06:01.279 People be like, okay, so you like love superheroes. 00:06:01.439 --> 00:06:04.639 I'm like, yeah, I mean, I guess I'm actually beyond that now, bro. 00:06:04.800 --> 00:06:05.839 I'm like on a different level. 00:06:05.920 --> 00:06:13.360 It's like those memes where the guy's like, you know, it's like the the space like brain, like he just is getting more and more like mind-blown type of whatever else. 00:06:13.519 --> 00:06:15.279 But uh yeah, we're on a different level now. 00:06:15.519 --> 00:06:16.800 We're into storytelling, yeah. 00:06:16.879 --> 00:06:18.079 We're into storytelling. 00:06:18.240 --> 00:06:21.279 Um they'd be telling stories in that's for sure, too. 00:06:21.360 --> 00:06:23.120 But we're we just we've expanded. 00:06:23.279 --> 00:06:23.839 So who knows? 00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:26.079 Maybe maybe season two we are changing the intro. 00:06:26.160 --> 00:06:26.399 I don't know. 00:06:26.879 --> 00:06:28.480 We are reading a lot of superhero stories. 00:06:29.040 --> 00:06:31.439 I'm not trying to put any shade on superhero stories at all. 00:06:31.680 --> 00:06:32.160 We have a great one. 00:06:32.319 --> 00:06:33.199 That's part of the fun of this. 00:06:33.279 --> 00:06:34.720 We're like we fuck with superheroes. 00:06:34.800 --> 00:06:35.040 It's cool. 00:06:35.360 --> 00:06:38.800 Superheroes, it's superheroes and go check out our Invincible episodes. 00:06:38.879 --> 00:06:40.959 We're reading Invincible right now. 00:06:41.120 --> 00:06:44.639 Yeah, and Invincible is just like such a celebration of superheroes. 00:06:44.879 --> 00:06:45.120 It is. 00:06:45.199 --> 00:06:45.920 Uh definitely is. 00:06:46.079 --> 00:06:51.839 But Deadly Class is more just a examination of fucked up kids. 00:06:52.079 --> 00:06:54.639 Yeah, fucked up kids and just like the things. 00:06:54.879 --> 00:07:03.199 Violence and the things that have led to um that violence and that shit being fucked up and these kids being either. 00:07:03.279 --> 00:07:15.199 I mean, our main main guy, Marcus, who we'll talk about in just a bit here, is disenfranchised, out on the street, very angry for um real tangible reasons. 00:07:15.279

--> 00:07:19.360 Um and his family. 00:07:19.600 --> 00:07:20.240 Yep. 00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:22.079 Um that's good. 00:07:22.319 --> 00:07:24.560 Yes, let's see, uh jump into the dossier. 00:07:24.720 --> 00:07:28.959 Uh there's a little we got a little blurb prepared here about why Deadly Class matters. 00:07:29.199 --> 00:07:33.839 Deadly Class became one of Image Comics' defining creator-owned books of the 2010s. 00:07:33.920 --> 00:07:42.480 While its premise sounds like Harry Potter for Assassins, the series is really about trauma, identity, class, abuse, and survival. 00:07:42.639 --> 00:07:54.959 Much of Marcus's perspective is drawn from Rick Remender's own experiences growing up in the punk scene of 1980s California, giving the story an unusually personal voice beneath its violent exterior. 00:07:55.199 --> 00:07:55.839 There you go, right? 00:07:55.920 --> 00:07:56.639 That personal voice. 00:07:56.720 --> 00:08:00.399 And this is also just uh and another way fun for me being from California. 00:08:00.560 --> 00:08:01.839 This is in the Bay Area, right? 00:08:01.920 --> 00:08:02.959 That's where all the shit is going down. 00:08:03.199 --> 00:08:09.600 When I moved to LA, the my lock screen of my phone and my computer has been Deadly Class. 00:08:09.759 --> 00:08:12.560 It's it's like the gang from Deadly Class hanging out in front of a 7-Elevens. 00:08:12.879 --> 00:08:13.360 It's so funny. 00:08:13.439 --> 00:08:21.600 I'm like, now it's like it's so funny that you guys are hearing this because I've just been seeing these like lock screens on Ben's like computer for the longest time, right? 00:08:21.680 --> 00:08:25.360 And now I'm I know I'm contextualizing all of the things that are going on. 00:08:25.519 --> 00:08:32.480 And even I actually don't even think it's in the part that we're getting into today today, but there are 7-Elevens are involved in this story for sure. 00:08:32.720 --> 00:08:38.320 Yeah, 7-Elevens are a big part of our life here in the valley in in Los Angeles in general. 00:08:38.559 --> 00:08:45.679 Um But yeah, and then actually my phone, I guess my phone, I where's my my phone lock screen now is Yeah, let's see what it is. 00:08:46.080 --> 00:08:49.039 Oh wow, yeah, we got it from our boy Silver Surfer. 00:08:49.120 --> 00:08:49.600 Yes, sir. 00:08:49.840 --> 00:08:51.840 Yep, and that inspired me to change it. 00:08:52.000 --> 00:08:56.080 So um yeah, it's been but it's been deadly class for a few years. 00:08:56.159 --> 00:08:59.679 That that was sort of the energy I was trying to bring into my move to LA, you know. 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:01.840 Just no fucks giving. 00:09:02.240 --> 00:09:03.679 I'm trying to I'm trying to kill people. 00:09:04.000 --> 00:09:06.320 I'm trying to do drugs and kill people. 00:09:06.639 --> 00:09:10.320 Yeah, which uh which half of that will happen in LA. 00:09:10.399 --> 00:09:14.480 And I guess depending on where you're at, you get to pick what half, but you know, right, right, right, right. 00:09:14.799 --> 00:09:15.360 It's a good time. 00:09:15.440 --> 00:09:30.879 But so diving into deadly class, one thing that we'll talk about before we get into the actual issues, and I think actually I'm gonna I'm gonna probably hand this over to you just because of what you were talking about with the art, but just seeing like Wes Craig and Lee Lowridge are doing with um the art in this is just crazy. 00:09:30.960 --> 00:09:39.759 I mean, the first thing that I'll say here is like the color palette that is picked for this, I think does feel distinct than a good amount of the stuff that we've even read so far. 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:43.279 And I think that um I mean there's a lot of really, really cool art. 00:09:43.360 --> 00:10:08.080 It's it's funny, it's it's one of these things, and I it's kind of fun for me and Ben because there's a lot of times where when we come to this um come to do this podcast together that well, you know, Ben will be like opening up a book and being and saying, Hey bro, you gotta check out this like thing, and I'll like turn my computer around and we've taken like a screenshot of like the same thing, and there's a lot of that that goes on here, but there's just a lot of really, really cool, not only color usage and stuff like that, but um just the way that the panel panels play with each other. 00:10:08.240 --> 00:10:13.440 We're gonna have to talk about our boy Scotty again, of course, um, and just the kind of these moment-to-moment things and whichever else. 00:10:13.600 --> 00:10:18.559 But um, I've enjoyed this so far, and I think that especially like the action that we end up seeing. 00:10:18.720 --> 00:10:20.720 I don't know if you guys heard the fireworks going on. 00:10:20.879 --> 00:10:22.080 Yeah, it's it's a it's the fifth of July. 00:10:22.159 --> 00:10:24.480 We're still going. 00:10:24.720 --> 00:10:30.639 Um, but uh I I really enjoy, I think, the way that they do like the action and like the choreography of this stuff. 00:10:30.720 --> 00:10:36.720 There's actually a specific scene that I think I think we'll get to talk about in this, but um yeah, it's just it's choreographed. 00:10:36.799 --> 00:10:37.679 Like that's the word that I want to use. 00:10:37.759 --> 00:10:39.120 It's choreographed very, very well. 00:10:39.200 --> 00:10:40.799 But anyway, that's kind of the intro to the art. 00:10:40.879 --> 00:10:42.480 What what else do you got to say, Ben, about the art? 00:10:42.799 --> 00:10:43.759 About the art in general. 00:10:43.919 --> 00:10:49.279 I mean, I think one thing uh that's really striking about this is the way they they set up the panels, right? 00:10:49.360 --> 00:10:58.320 That's our big thing from uh the core thing where I was trying to talk about from Scott McLeod, understanding comics is their use of storytelling through these panels, right? 00:10:58.480 --> 00:11:07.919 Um, right off the bat, all the panels are just white negative space that cut these lines

through the art that is taking up like the whole page, basically. 00:11:08.159 --> 00:11:10.159 And that they never break that. 00:11:10.240 --> 00:11:14.639 Uh at least in in what we have so far, what we've looked at, it's entirely that way. 00:11:14.720 --> 00:11:18.960 So it feels so uniform, it feels super like designed in that way. 00:11:19.200 --> 00:11:24.799 Um, all the panels are usually just like rectangular, but they're in all sorts of different directions. 00:11:25.200 --> 00:11:28.240 Uh when action is happening, they'll have them slanted to the side. 00:11:28.399 --> 00:11:31.440 When something chaotic is happening, they'll have them in a jumble. 00:11:31.600 --> 00:11:40.240 One of the coolest uses I've seen so far is they'll have these huge splash pages that are of a really zoomed out like overhead shot of the scene. 00:11:40.320 --> 00:11:40.480 Right. 00:11:40.720 --> 00:11:42.799 Almost looks like a Where's Waldo type page. 00:11:43.039 --> 00:11:43.200 Yes. 00:11:43.279 --> 00:11:48.320 I mean, it I that was the first, like the first thing that came to my mind with some of these was Where's Waldo for sure. 00:11:48.559 --> 00:11:48.720 Right. 00:11:48.879 --> 00:12:00.080 But then and then in within that larger picture, there will be zoomed in smaller panels that are telling our story and letting time pass across this larger picture. 00:12:00.320 --> 00:12:05.600 They do that a couple different times, and that's just remarkably well done. 00:12:05.840 --> 00:12:07.840 Um, the biggest thing though is color. 00:12:07.919 --> 00:12:11.519 I mean, the the the use of color is just just phenomenal. 00:12:11.600 --> 00:12:14.480 It's so stark, there's very little shading. 00:12:14.639 --> 00:12:22.799 Everything is just these uh block, uh block fill sort of um sort of techniques. 00:12:22.960 --> 00:12:29.919 It also each page is thought of from like a color perspective like as a whole. 00:12:30.240 --> 00:12:34.879 Uh, and that energy really carries through what's going on in that scene. 00:12:35.120 --> 00:12:41.039 Um it and it will be with it's not just like setting to setting, they'll change the the color palette. 00:12:41.120 --> 00:12:47.600 They could be in the same setting, but what the energy, like whatever energy is happening, um, is what it's going to be depicted in. 00:12:47.759 --> 00:12:52.799 I'm looking at some of these pictures here, like we've got a motorcycle chase, and I was just see again, this is what I'm talking about. 00:12:52.879 --> 00:12:55.919 I was just literally looking at that right now, thinking the same thing. 00:12:56.399 --> 00:13:01.679 Everything is maroon, everything is burgundy, like these really dark specific reds. 00:13:01.759 --> 00:13:07.039 Um, and then you turn the next page and we're inside the cop car, which is all blue. 00:13:07.200 --> 00:13:11.679 And then they do they crash and they're fleeing, and now everything is yellow. 00:13:11.919 --> 00:13:15.519 Um, so it's just really fresh

and and cool. 00:13:15.679 --> 00:13:24.960 Again, this is guys, we're trying our best to convey beautiful art through us just you gotta go pick it up, saying words like you gotta look at this. 00:13:25.279 --> 00:13:26.000 You gotta look at it. 00:13:26.159 --> 00:13:29.200 Um obviously check the IG, check the IG, it'll be up there too. 00:13:29.279 --> 00:13:30.320 But yeah, go get the book. 00:13:30.639 --> 00:13:38.559 At the very least, check the IG, which is kickback comics pod underscore, underscore pod, maybe on in on Instagram. 00:13:38.799 --> 00:13:42.960 And I hey, I try I I try to carefully select, I can only post 20 at a time. 00:13:43.120 --> 00:13:43.519 It doesn't matter. 00:13:43.679 --> 00:13:52.000 But I try to carefully select the the 20 most relevant uh pages, and I pick uh some cool ass music that fits the tone. 00:13:52.159 --> 00:13:55.679 That's true, and you can listen to the snippet of that song and look at the art. 00:13:55.919 --> 00:13:59.600 And it's gonna feel good, it's gonna feel good, and you're gonna be like, that's what they're talking about. 00:14:00.080 --> 00:14:00.879 I get it though. 00:14:01.039 --> 00:14:02.399 You know, okay, random thing. 00:14:02.480 --> 00:14:06.720 This is this is just a random interjection before we get into the the the realness of it. 00:14:06.799 --> 00:14:12.080 So, first thing, I was looking up Where's Waldo just because just I wanted to see again 1987. 00:14:12.240 --> 00:14:16.960 That's when the first book comes out, which makes sense for also the timing of when the story is going on. 00:14:17.200 --> 00:14:22.480 Funny thing, I also just learned it's called Where's Wally originally. 00:14:22.799 --> 00:14:23.840 I did not know that. 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:32.559 It's literally, bro, we're getting like translations from like you like UK and Australian English into North American English where it's Where's Waldo, bro? 00:14:32.639 --> 00:14:33.519 Who is Waldo? 00:14:33.919 --> 00:14:35.120 But we gotta find it. 00:14:35.279 --> 00:14:37.039 We gotta find there it is. 00:14:37.200 --> 00:14:38.720 But anyway, Where's Wally? 00:14:39.039 --> 00:14:42.320 That I I almost felt like I was having like a what do they call it? 00:14:42.399 --> 00:14:47.360 Like the Mandela effect or whatever else you're like misremembering, but Where's Waldo also existed? 00:14:47.440 --> 00:14:48.080 So that's funny. 00:14:48.159 --> 00:14:49.600 I haven't thought about that in a while. 00:14:49.759 --> 00:15:01.759 I am I I I've spent a lot of time living and uh traveling and stuff in Europe, and there's hella stuff like that that I forever forget about where it's like, oh, you guys just have a oh we there's a different word for that. 00:15:02.000 --> 00:15:02.559 Yeah, yeah. 00:15:02.720 --> 00:15:03.759 But anyway, shout-out Wally. 00:15:04.080 --> 00:15:05.440 Shout out Wally, shout out Waldo. 00:15:05.759 --> 00:15:06.879 Yeah, the boys. 00:15:07.120 --> 00:15:08.320 All right, let's get into it. 00:15:08.559 --> 00:15:10.480 Deadly class issue number one. 00:15:10.559 --> 00:15:14.639 Um I'll read our little issue summary here and then we'll we'll get into the deeper parts of this. 00:15:14.720 --> 00:15:24.960 But so our protagonist, Marcus Lopez Arguello, um, is homeless in 1987 San Francisco, the year of Wally, uh, or yeah, the year of Wally, 1987. 00:15:25.360 --> 00:15:30.720 And in the year of our Lord and Savior Wally, 1987 San Francisco, living with the weight of a violent past. 00:15:30.799 --> 00:15:36.320 Um, after a police chase, he's rescued by students of this school called uh King's Dominion. 00:15:36.399 --> 00:15:39.600 It's got a longer name, which we'll talk about, but it's a secret school for assassins. 00:15:39.759 --> 00:15:54.639 Um the uh master of this uh schoolmaster, Lynn, offers him a place at it, uh, seek potential in his anger, survival instincts, and also the um revenge that he wants to uh enact upon specific individuals. 00:15:54.720 --> 00:16:05.919 Um and this issue ends with Marcus stepping into this kind of dangerous new world where he's been homeless, and a lot of this first issue is him experiencing that and just dealing with the shittiness that is being homeless. 00:16:06.080 --> 00:16:14.720 Um but then yeah, he gets into this new world unexpectedly, and uh it's gonna be a crazy ride from from the beginning. 00:16:14.879 --> 00:16:17.600 But so this was an interesting first chapter. 00:16:17.679 --> 00:16:22.159 We get a lot of the lay of the land of who Marcus is, just the things that he's experiencing. 00:16:22.320 --> 00:16:32.399 Um being homeless, uh the the the death of his parents, which is I mean, just it's it's pretty like horrific that whole situation. 00:16:32.559 --> 00:16:34.399 But um Yeah, it's not cute. 00:16:34.639 --> 00:16:37.679 It's it's very uh cute, that is correct. 00:16:37.919 --> 00:16:40.720 Yeah, it's it's it's again unapologetic. 00:16:41.039 --> 00:16:48.720 It's brutal, it's a pretty brutal snapshot of what life on the streets could be like for a teenager, uh for anybody, realistically. 00:16:48.879 --> 00:16:52.879 Um but yeah, that we we get sh literal shots of him just begging for money. 00:16:52.960 --> 00:16:55.360 He's saying, uh, I've been paranoid lately. 00:16:55.440 --> 00:16:57.360 I feel like I'm being watched, but nobody sees me. 00:16:57.440 --> 00:16:59.279 Not really, do they just look through me? 00:16:59.840 --> 00:17:03.759 Um they wonder if I let this happen, they must think I'm weak. 00:17:03.919 --> 00:17:05.440 Can't imagine that they would end up here. 00:17:05.839 --> 00:17:07.759 That's always always such a classic. 00:17:07.920 --> 00:17:14.960 And I think I'm gonna even keep reading the thing that you did because it was one of the quotes that I wrote down, but he says, you know, someone walking by them in their shanty home ignoring their existence. 00:17:15.119 --> 00:17:17.519 It's just way easier to judge the poor than to be

charitable. 00:17:17.680 --> 00:17:21.200 Easier to think I've done something to deserve this, and in my case, maybe they're right. 00:17:21.440 --> 00:17:25.519 And they got this really like devious image of him when they say that. 00:17:25.680 --> 00:17:27.119 So there's something that we're gonna learn here. 00:17:27.279 --> 00:17:40.079 We haven't learned it yet, but maybe there's some shit going down with Marcus, um the complex idea of deserving that, but uh, you know, Marcus is a complex guy, as we'll go on to to learn. 00:17:40.240 --> 00:17:46.960 Um he ends up uh he's trying to get some money from these uh guys and he gives this guy gives him like a paper. 00:17:47.039 --> 00:17:54.559 I think he gives him just like the job section of the paper, um, and Marcus steals his wallet and thinks about even going and paying him a visit later. 00:17:54.720 --> 00:18:04.720 But the big thing that we get here is going through these months where Marcus is sleeping in the rough, sleeping outside, um, and we get this memory of basically how his parents uh ended up dying. 00:18:04.799 --> 00:18:19.359 And we get I might actually end end up reading kind of the whole chunk of this just to give you guys the background of his parents, but um he talks about the thing that's keeping that's uh keeping him awake is not the cold and in uh and him thinking about the winter, but he says it's the dreams of sunshine. 00:18:19.759 --> 00:18:22.160 Seeing the two of them again makes the cold that much harder to bear. 00:18:22.240 --> 00:18:26.079 Uh Marcus Lopez Arguello, he had to change his name after we took it. 00:18:26.160 --> 00:18:27.440 Uh we came here, so I took it. 00:18:27.599 --> 00:18:29.759 So this is about his dad and mom. 00:18:30.160 --> 00:18:34.720 He says his dad was a cop, a cop who was tricked into helping Reagan CIA smuggle arms to the Contras. 00:18:34.960 --> 00:18:40.079 The Sandististas or S um Sandinistas uh blew up our home in payment. 00:18:40.160 --> 00:18:41.519 Uh this isn't a dress rehearsal. 00:18:41.599 --> 00:18:43.680 This is uh what his dad sent him uh said to him. 00:18:43.759 --> 00:18:45.200 This isn't a dress rehearsal, Marcus. 00:18:45.359 --> 00:18:46.480 You you only get the one turn. 00:18:46.640 --> 00:18:48.160 Life is a series of unique opportunities. 00:18:48.240 --> 00:18:50.240 It's our job to find the happiness in each one. 00:18:50.799 --> 00:18:54.480 Um when when uh Marcus was five, they fled Nicaragua. 00:18:54.559 --> 00:18:59.519 Uh, they were given refuge in San Francisco, and after years of turmoil, his mom and dad were finally happy. 00:18:59.599 --> 00:19:09.519 Um and Marcus was trying to, but what ends up happening, um, you know, he ends up saying that he starts kind of realizing that everybody's gonna die at some point and that bad things are waiting around the corner. 00:19:09.920 --> 00:19:13.839 Um and in the end, all of that anxiety, all that worrying about the future, it doesn't change anything.

00:19:13.920 --> 00:19:21.519 What we end up learning is that and this is actually goes into what his whole revenge story is later on, but he says Reagan cut funding to U.S. 00:19:21.519 --> 00:19:33.119 mental health facilities, releasing hundreds of mentally ill into the streets, including Barbara Salinger, suicidal schizophreniac, um or schizophrenic, um Barbara Salinger, who made every fear I ever had come true. 00:19:33.200 --> 00:19:40.799 And one of the things that um he doesn't say outright here, but we end up seeing through the panels is this woman basically ends up committing suicide. 00:19:40.880 --> 00:19:45.119 I'm assuming this is off of uh Golden Gate, which is uh very much a thing. 00:19:45.279 --> 00:19:53.599 Um but she ends up committing suicide off the edge of that bridge and she lands on top of both uh Marcus's parents and killing them both immediately. 00:19:53.680 --> 00:19:57.039 And so this is uh uh yeah, terrible. 00:19:57.119 --> 00:20:00.000 I mean, this all of these panels are also just like horrifying. 00:20:00.160 --> 00:20:00.720 Yeah, horrifying. 00:20:00.799 --> 00:20:04.000 It almost I don't know if you've ever actually seen you ever seen the movie Schindler's List? 00:20:04.319 --> 00:20:05.759 Oh, yeah, with the red with the red. 00:20:06.000 --> 00:20:19.440 So there's a little bit of a kind of thing right there, but this a lot of this these panels here in the memory are gray, except for this kind of red balloon, and then the only other red that appears after that is all of the blood after the the suicide ends up happening and killing both of his parents. 00:20:19.519 --> 00:20:21.519 So really intense off the bat. 00:20:21.839 --> 00:20:28.559 And so yeah, so that's really the origin of our main character here is he uh wants to kill Reagan. 00:20:28.720 --> 00:20:29.039 Yes. 00:20:29.200 --> 00:20:40.960 And a big part of that is Reagan cutting, I mean, he cut funding and changed regulation all across America for in in many ways that we're still grappling with now in the real world. 00:20:41.200 --> 00:20:42.160 Just Google that shit. 00:20:42.400 --> 00:20:45.200 Google Google Reagan and you will have a very sad time, probably. 00:20:45.279 --> 00:21:01.039 But um, but regardless, uh yeah, one of the things Reagan did was uh release all of these homeless people that had been in mental health facilities throughout the country, just kicked him out, and then this lady, schizophrenic lady, committed suicide on top of his parents. 00:21:01.119 --> 00:21:01.519 Yep. 00:21:01.920 --> 00:21:05.759 Um what a what how wild, how novel. 00:21:06.160 --> 00:21:07.200 What a crazy background. 00:21:07.359 --> 00:21:13.599 And then he ends up like going in and out of different foster homes, have r living rough, and then ending up on the streets as a teenager. 00:21:13.680 --> 00:21:14.000 Yep. 00:21:14.160 --> 00:21:25.440 Uh, which also just relates, you know, part of the thing we're examining, homelessness tied to um you know, Reagan putting all these people back on the streets who were in facilities and whatnot. 00:21:25.599 --> 00:21:28.480 Um clearly something that the author is trying to examine. 00:21:28.720 --> 00:21:34.160 Also him being from California, the homelessness and housing problems Yeah, the epidemics that are happening. 00:21:34.400 --> 00:21:36.480 I mean, still a lot of this stuff is going on, right? 00:21:36.640 --> 00:21:43.839 And it's it's which is part of what makes what makes this book so cool to read is this book was published in the 2010s. 00:21:44.000 --> 00:21:44.240 Right. 00:21:44.400 --> 00:21:46.160 Uh it's set in the eighties. 00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:59.440 We're reading it in the tail end of the 2020s, and it's all relevant, which is I mean, it's like it's cool in the fact that it still feels fresh, and it's also terrible in the fact that it is still very, very relevant, right, of what's going on. 00:21:59.519 --> 00:22:14.319 But Yeah, so uh Marcus is is definitely not a fan of Reagan, and we kind of continue to go through his um kind of day-by-day existence of getting his shoes stolen, where we kind of see the first moment of Marcus's possible violent tendencies. 00:22:14.480 --> 00:22:24.160 Um I mean he's getting his stuff stolen, this guy's stealing his journal, which is something he really doesn't want to lose, but he basically almost ends up killing this guy until he learns that the guy has an in uh an infection. 00:22:24.240 --> 00:22:30.319 He actually ends up giving him uh the shoes, uh, but he just wants his journal in his backpack, and so he keeps that and keeps going on. 00:22:30.559 --> 00:22:34.559 We also start seeing that somebody is definitely um watching him. 00:22:34.720 --> 00:22:45.599 And he he actually realized this a little bit earlier, but somebody is watching him, and we're starting to see um somebody with tattoos kind of in the background of some of these uh images here, which is pretty interesting. 00:22:45.759 --> 00:22:47.440 I definitely did not know who this was. 00:22:47.599 --> 00:22:48.640 Um Yeah. 00:22:49.039 --> 00:22:57.599 We're getting we don't even know it yet, but we're getting introduced to some who are gonna be some of his clique when he ends up at the school in the deadly class, as it were. 00:22:57.839 --> 00:22:58.799 Yeah, as it as it were. 00:22:59.039 --> 00:23:01.759 But yeah, it's some other big moments from the first first chapter. 00:23:01.839 --> 00:23:04.960 Is he it looks like he is actually gonna commit suicide himself. 00:23:05.119 --> 00:23:05.519 Yep. 00:23:05.680 --> 00:23:11.039 Um, he is like when things are bad enough, uh, you know, he's like, I I need help. 00:23:11.279 --> 00:23:14.400 Need to find some kind of reason to keep fighting no matter how hard I try. 00:23:14.559 --> 00:23:17.119 The bad voice won't rest, and I'm losing the fight. 00:23:17.279 --> 00:23:27.119 Um so and then this woman, he hears this voice basically tell him to not jump, uh, which

ends up we realize later being one of his future classmates. 00:23:27.359 --> 00:23:33.200 Uh then he we we have this whole scene where uh police are sort of after him and start start chasing. 00:23:34.000 --> 00:23:35.200 This is actually, I do love the scene. 00:23:35.279 --> 00:23:37.599 This is the one that I was thinking about when I was thinking about choreography. 00:23:37.680 --> 00:23:45.200 We have this is um during Dia de los Muertos in um and I guess obviously I think this is in the mission district in in San Francisco. 00:23:45.359 --> 00:24:06.720 Um and the way that the action is interwoven with the dancing of I think what we actually end up learning on uh uh later on is another member of the deadly class, but the inner the um inter kind of splicing of the action and her dancing and the way that they do all this stuff is actually really kind of um really beautiful the way that they go uh in between this. 00:24:06.799 --> 00:24:09.200 And I I like this piece uh piece of this a lot for sure. 00:24:09.440 --> 00:24:10.079 Yeah, it's amazing. 00:24:10.160 --> 00:24:14.240 She's got the full makeup, uh like her face is like one of the sugar skulls or whatever. 00:24:15.519 --> 00:24:19.680 Um and yeah, so we see she's there dancing, she's causing the distraction. 00:24:19.759 --> 00:24:24.799 Uh we've got our boy Willie tells him, hey, it's a sting, basically give him the heads up he needs to run. 00:24:25.039 --> 00:24:25.920 We don't even know Willie yet. 00:24:26.000 --> 00:24:26.799 We don't even know him yet. 00:24:26.880 --> 00:24:27.359 Yeah, exactly. 00:24:27.599 --> 00:24:30.160 But he says, Hey brother, you gotta get out of here. 00:24:30.400 --> 00:24:35.759 Uh then uh the character that we later learned is named uh Saya Soya, right? 00:24:35.839 --> 00:24:36.640 Yeah, I think Saya. 00:24:36.960 --> 00:24:40.079 Saya, she has a motorcycle, she's just like get on. 00:24:40.799 --> 00:24:43.599 It was kind of like Girl with the Dragon tattoo kind of looking. 00:24:43.920 --> 00:24:47.920 Yeah, we she's Japanese, we learn, and she has hella tattoos. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:48.400 Yeah. 00:24:48.559 --> 00:24:49.920 Um, which is sick. 00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:51.119 He jumps on the motorcycle. 00:24:51.200 --> 00:24:53.759 That we have this whole amazing police chase. 00:24:53.920 --> 00:24:56.319 Uh this is some interesting panels in here for sure. 00:24:56.480 --> 00:24:57.279 Yeah, oh my gosh. 00:24:57.359 --> 00:25:00.880 At interesting angles, making it feel like they have momentum. 00:25:01.039 --> 00:25:11.599 Also, like the similar use where there's larger pictures, and then our characters are like pictured multiple times, leaping throughout the artwork in ways that are crazy. 00:25:11.759 --> 00:25:14.880 Um, but yeah, she she is really on some some X Games mode. 00:25:15.039 --> 00:25:15.359 Yeah, bro. 00:25:15.440 --> 00:25:17.440 I I wrote in my notes, I was like, this girl is a ninja. 00:25:17.599 --> 00:25:18.400 I was

like, goddamn. 00:25:18.559 --> 00:25:22.079 Yeah, she's like doing flips, busting through windshields, kills a cop. 00:25:22.400 --> 00:25:23.680 Um, it's wild. 00:25:23.759 --> 00:25:26.000 Our main character is just barely making it through all the stuff. 00:25:26.160 --> 00:25:27.279 Yeah, just holding onto the motorcycle. 00:25:27.599 --> 00:25:30.559 She ends up stabbing a cop who's gonna shoot him with a katana. 00:25:31.119 --> 00:25:34.400 Um, and so basically this whole thing, it's it's real violence. 00:25:34.480 --> 00:25:37.519 It's not like PG 13, whatever violence. 00:25:37.599 --> 00:25:43.359 So the the violence depicted in these books is uh in some in some ways realistic. 00:25:43.599 --> 00:25:51.279 Obviously, people aren't always like front flipping between cars and stuff, but yeah, um, but they stab people and shoot people the same way. 00:25:51.519 --> 00:25:52.480 Yeah, they definitely do. 00:25:53.119 --> 00:25:53.359 All do. 00:25:53.599 --> 00:26:02.640 And this is also where we start to get, I mean, within kind of these uh probably like 10 pages altogether, there's like moments where kind of what Ben was talking about earlier, where there's color, right? 00:26:02.720 --> 00:26:10.319 There's like red, which is like kind of takes over for a moment, then we have these moments of blue, these moments of yellow, where like everything is tinted this way. 00:26:10.559 --> 00:26:13.680 Um and it's it's it's it's fun. 00:26:13.920 --> 00:26:20.880 I I you know, I feel like this is something that maybe I I probably have thought about it in some ways, but like you know, using color as like a storytelling device, right? 00:26:20.960 --> 00:26:27.279 Like this is to a certain extent kind of giving us um the separation of the moments, right, through color. 00:26:27.359 --> 00:26:35.920 It's like these each of these beats that are happening are like there's like the the beat that's red, there's the moment that's like yellow, there's the moment that's blue, right? 00:26:36.000 --> 00:26:41.680 And each of these are distinct moments in their own right, and that color palette gives them even more of the vibe. 00:26:41.759 --> 00:26:43.839 Like it kind of works for actually where they are too. 00:26:43.920 --> 00:26:52.240 It's like you're underneath these bright lights and you get this yellow tint to everything, but it also works very, very well for the feeling of what's actually going on in the scene as well. 00:26:52.559 --> 00:26:53.039 Yep. 00:26:53.200 --> 00:26:54.240 Yeah, it's amazing. 00:26:54.400 --> 00:26:55.920 You guys just gotta look at it for yourselves. 00:26:56.240 --> 00:26:56.799 Yeah, you really do. 00:26:57.440 --> 00:27:00.160 Um, narrative-wise, this guy, what's his name? 00:27:00.480 --> 00:27:00.640 Mr. 00:27:00.799 --> 00:27:01.119 Lynn. 00:27:01.359 --> 00:27:01.680 True. 00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:02.480 Master Lynn. 00:27:02.720 --> 00:27:03.279 Master Lynn. 00:27:03.359 --> 00:27:04.400 Master Lynn pulls up. 00:27:04.480 --> 00:27:06.240 They've kidnapped him, all his all his classmates. 00:27:08.079 --> 00:27:14.240 He gets kidnapped, and that's when we learn that all these people that have been helping out with this escape are part of the deadly class, as it were. 00:27:14.480 --> 00:27:14.640 Right. 00:27:14.720 --> 00:27:18.400 And he's basically this guy pitches Master Lynn's like, hey, your life sucks. 00:27:18.480 --> 00:27:24.160 You should come be in my school, and we're gonna train you to be one of the world's greatest assassins surrounded by other assassins. 00:27:24.319 --> 00:27:25.839 Um, and it's gonna be sick. 00:27:25.920 --> 00:27:27.359 It's gonna be on some John Wick shit. 00:27:27.440 --> 00:27:28.559 That movie's not even gonna come out. 00:27:28.640 --> 00:27:29.599 But yeah, for a minute. 00:27:29.680 --> 00:27:30.960 And Marcus is like, nah. 00:27:31.119 --> 00:27:34.799 Yes, and then you know changes his mind. 00:27:35.039 --> 00:27:35.200 Yeah. 00:27:35.440 --> 00:27:38.160 Girl comes out, she says, Hey, what if you did do this? 00:27:38.319 --> 00:27:39.759 And he's like, Alright, you got a good point. 00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:46.079 Also, same same woman, same, same girl, Pierre, who told him not to commit suicide, uh, got him on the motorcycle. 00:27:46.160 --> 00:27:49.279 She's really the one made like turning his life around here. 00:27:49.440 --> 00:27:52.160 Yeah, and she's or at least turning it, turning it in some direction. 00:27:52.400 --> 00:27:52.799 In a direction. 00:27:52.960 --> 00:27:53.519 Yeah, in a direction. 00:27:53.759 --> 00:27:55.119 It's not like they're getting it right. 00:27:55.200 --> 00:27:58.079 It's not like, hey, come, come come be happy. 00:27:58.160 --> 00:28:00.640 It's like, bro, your life is already so bad. 00:28:01.039 --> 00:28:02.480 At least you can sleep somewhere, am I right? 00:28:02.640 --> 00:28:05.279 Yeah, we'll give you a bed and make you kill people. 00:28:05.440 --> 00:28:08.480 Yeah, and so that's that will be better than what you have going on right now. 00:28:08.799 --> 00:28:13.839 Yeah, and so she actually one of the things that Master Lynn says is, you know, his choices are now on your head, Saya. 00:28:14.160 --> 00:28:18.160 So um, she's gonna be kind of the one who's uh uh uh taking control of this stuff. 00:28:18.240 --> 00:28:27.440 And we learn all the rules of their um society that's in there, basically that if they ever, you know, if he ever reveals the location of the school, uh Master Lynn says you will be eviscerated in your sleep. 00:28:27.519 --> 00:28:30.559 Um there's no insine killing, no sex, no drugs. 00:28:30.960 --> 00:28:32.240 Tough first couple of ones. 00:28:32.319 --> 00:28:33.119 Uh they don't really follow. 00:28:33.680 --> 00:28:34.799 They don't follow that at all. 00:28:35.279 --> 00:28:37.839 No disobedience, you know, do what your instructors say. 00:28:38.000 --> 00:28:45.599 Um and they see a lot of raw talent in him, but he he gets

introduced to the school, and I guess this is underground, I guess it is. 00:28:45.920 --> 00:28:47.440 Yeah, I think it is. 00:28:47.519 --> 00:28:49.680 They go through all these, all these like tunnels and stuff. 00:28:49.759 --> 00:28:55.039 So it's like a whole park, uh, like a it's like a Hogwarts adjacent looking. 00:28:55.440 --> 00:28:55.759 Yeah. 00:28:56.000 --> 00:28:57.680 But I guess underneath San Francisco. 00:28:57.920 --> 00:29:00.960 Yeah, the King's Dominion School of the Deadly Arts. 00:29:01.039 --> 00:29:04.400 And we get this full big splash page that shows us what this place looks like. 00:29:04.480 --> 00:29:07.920 It's kind of like a it's kind of like a haunted mansion type of thing. 00:29:08.079 --> 00:29:13.680 They got the Grim Reaper statue out there, but we get this really kind of crazy blue hue of being underneath. 00:29:13.759 --> 00:29:15.839 But that's what wraps up issue number one. 00:29:16.480 --> 00:29:17.039 Crazy. 00:29:17.200 --> 00:29:18.960 I mean, it's it's intense off-rip. 00:29:19.119 --> 00:29:25.039 We're getting a lot of action, we're getting a lot of violence, we're getting a lot of important backstory to who Marcus is um himself. 00:29:25.279 --> 00:29:28.880 And uh yeah, I mean, we're about to just get deeper into it. 00:29:28.960 --> 00:29:30.799 It's this it ramps up pretty quick. 00:29:30.880 --> 00:29:32.880 And so I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna dive into issue number two. 00:29:33.119 --> 00:29:34.240 Do you want to do the summary for this one? 00:29:34.480 --> 00:29:34.640 Sure. 00:29:34.720 --> 00:29:35.519 Yeah, I can read it. 00:29:35.759 --> 00:29:36.960 All right, so issue number two. 00:29:37.200 --> 00:29:42.000 Marcus begins adjusting to King's Dominion and learns how brutal the school's social structure really is. 00:29:42.319 --> 00:29:42.799 High school. 00:29:42.960 --> 00:29:44.480 Yep, it it's ex yeah. 00:29:44.640 --> 00:29:45.519 Um, it's tough. 00:29:45.680 --> 00:29:51.759 He meets different cliques, including legacies from major criminal families and other outsider rats like himself. 00:29:51.839 --> 00:29:55.839 Uh, he starts forming connections with Willie, Saya, Maria, and Billy. 00:29:56.000 --> 00:30:00.240 The issue sets up his first real assignment to kill someone who deserves it. 00:30:00.400 --> 00:30:00.799 Yep. 00:30:01.119 --> 00:30:02.799 Uh, which is which is wild. 00:30:03.039 --> 00:30:08.160 Um, yeah, we get, I mean, basically, this is him getting acquainted with the school, right? 00:30:08.319 --> 00:30:15.920 Uh we learned some like like we sort of mentioned, uh, every student from Dominion sort of comes from a different criminal tradition, and it's referencing a lot of that. 00:30:16.000 --> 00:30:21.839 Like we've got the Yakuza, we've got cartels, we've got the mafia, street games, yeah. 00:30:22.079 --> 00:30:34.160 Spies, cults, um, you know, all these different tropes that we could think of that are like spy under underground, underworld, uh gang affiliated, mob affiliated. 00:30:34.240 --> 00:30:39.599 We've got sort of like stereotypical um students that are all sort of clicked up like that. 00:30:39.680 --> 00:30:46.640 Like it's if this is Hogwarts, it's like the houses are literally just uh like split up by like race and right. 00:30:46.799 --> 00:30:54.880 It kind of reminded me of like until I started seeing actually because when you see all of the groups, there's it's a little bit more nuanced than than race a little bit. 00:30:55.039 --> 00:31:05.279 Um, but they're pretty like it's kind of like prison type of situation where you go into prison and there's like you've got the Aryan gang, you've got the black gangs, you've got the Latino gangs, and everybody keeps separate like that. 00:31:05.519 --> 00:31:06.400 I found their names in here. 00:31:06.640 --> 00:31:09.200 It's a the preps, the Dixie mob. 00:31:09.279 --> 00:31:22.559 So it's like it's like the the the white New England kids, the redneck white kids, uh Sotovatos, yeah, Jersey Kings, the Italian, Sotovatos is like different um Hispanic, like Latin gangs. 00:31:22.880 --> 00:31:23.039 Yeah. 00:31:23.279 --> 00:31:29.039 The Final World, yeah, F FWO, the Final World Order from South Central Los Angeles, um leaders Willie. 00:31:29.440 --> 00:31:31.839 NWA is like the reference there, I feel like, right? 00:31:32.000 --> 00:31:32.640 With the FWO. 00:31:32.880 --> 00:31:33.680 I think you're definitely right. 00:31:33.759 --> 00:31:40.160 And then the Kuroki Syndicate, who are the Japanese gangsters, definitely um yeah, related to like the Yakuza, like you said. 00:31:40.400 --> 00:31:55.119 Um and you know, one of the kind of funny things about kind of stories like this, right, is it's all this crazy stuff that's going on, and it's still very much again, high school clicks, people got their friends, everybody's I mean, in this one, it's like he it's kind of funny. 00:31:55.279 --> 00:32:21.279 Every room that he walks into, everybody's just mean mugging the shit out of him because he also all of these kids um, and one of the things that Master Lynn actually says to them is that all of these kids are basically like um legacy, like all of their families have done something, and he's like the only kid in there who doesn't have legacy, and now all these kids are like um Master Lynn says, they're either afraid of you or they're gonna try and like fuck with you to see if you're for real. 00:32:21.680 --> 00:32:22.079 Right. 00:32:22.480 --> 00:32:24.559 Here's some stuff that that Lin is saying to him. 00:32:24.640 --> 00:32:28.079 He's saying he said, assuming by leaders you mean crime syndicates, right? 00:32:28.160 --> 00:32:29.440 He says there's little distinction. 00:32:29.680 --> 00:32:40.480 My ancestors started this school when we Chinese were treated lower than cattle, a school to train the oppressed in the deadly arts that they might shape a world more to their interests. 00:32:40.720 --> 00:32:43.759 Time

passed, our reputation grew, and our focus broadened. 00:32:43.920 --> 00:32:53.920 Since then we have trained the world's most famous and notorious assassins, but I have always remembered the true reason we exist to ensure those at the lowest level of society also have power. 00:32:54.160 --> 00:32:55.519 I know your history, Marcus. 00:32:55.599 --> 00:32:57.599 I know who has done you harm. 00:32:57.759 --> 00:33:04.720 I know why you joined us, I know the revenge that rests in your heart, and I would like to nourish it and sharpen it and teach it precision. 00:33:04.960 --> 00:33:10.240 I would like you to accomplish your great desire, but first there's much to learn. 00:33:11.039 --> 00:33:13.680 So that's part of the thesis we're getting about the school, right? 00:33:13.759 --> 00:33:19.519 Is he saying this isn't just about, oh, we're training people to kill people like James Bond type shit. 00:33:19.759 --> 00:33:34.240 We like the essential function of our school is to ensure that the people at the bottom of the all these pyramids have the ability to fucking kill some people and make the chin set the world up the way they need it to through violent action. 00:33:34.559 --> 00:33:35.359 Yep, yep. 00:33:35.599 --> 00:33:40.720 And uh we kind of this this whole issue also just gives us an introduction to the school as a whole, right? 00:33:40.799 --> 00:33:42.480 We see the classes that Marcus is taking. 00:33:42.640 --> 00:33:46.559 His first period is assassin psychology, his second period is beheading. 00:33:46.720 --> 00:33:49.039 I don't even understand how you make a full curriculum out of beheading. 00:33:49.119 --> 00:33:49.680 I'm not gonna lie to you. 00:33:49.759 --> 00:33:50.960 That was the first thing that came to my mind. 00:33:51.039 --> 00:33:54.079 I was like, how are we gonna talk about beheading for like three months? 00:33:54.160 --> 00:33:55.279 But who knows? 00:33:55.519 --> 00:33:58.480 Um he's also his third period is poison. 00:33:58.799 --> 00:34:00.880 I don't know, a little bit of a Harry Potter thing going on there. 00:34:00.960 --> 00:34:02.720 You know, they got their poison class, whatever else. 00:34:02.880 --> 00:34:07.440 But um they're learning through all of these uh insane methods. 00:34:07.519 --> 00:34:15.039 We see Marcus in the uh cafeteria, bro, literally the entire school is mean mugging this kid when he walks in there. 00:34:15.119 --> 00:34:27.280 And I think one of the funny things that he brings up is he talks about how even in this like crazy society of assassin kids, everybody's trying to like look cool, everybody's trying to look the hardest, everybody's trying to look whatever the fuck else. 00:34:27.440 --> 00:34:33.920 And his kind of thing that I feel like he brings to this is that he, yeah, some people are hard like that or whatever else, but he doesn't believe a lot of that shit. 00:34:34.000 --> 00:34:40.159 He's like, everybody's fucking pretending and trying to put on this shit

so that their clan, their group, whatever else thinks that they're really part of that shit. 00:34:40.400 --> 00:34:42.320 And we don't know the full story. 00:34:42.480 --> 00:34:45.119 Also, to be clear, we've read like the first five or six issues, right? 00:34:45.199 --> 00:34:46.880 We were further than we're gonna talk about today. 00:34:47.039 --> 00:34:49.920 We don't even fully uh have all this kid's background figured out. 00:34:50.159 --> 00:34:55.599 We just do know that he he is also like in some ways is just way harder than some of these kids. 00:34:55.679 --> 00:35:00.400 Obviously, some of them have uh maybe potentially killed some people or whatever, we don't know. 00:35:00.559 --> 00:35:05.039 But he's literally been homeless, been a drug addict, been in violence his whole life. 00:35:05.519 --> 00:35:09.199 Um his parents also were involved in some kind of espionage. 00:35:09.360 --> 00:35:13.360 Uh they died violently right in front of him as a child. 00:35:13.599 --> 00:35:17.280 Um, you know, he just is like, oh, look at these fucking preppy kids. 00:35:17.519 --> 00:35:18.320 Yeah, yeah, exactly. 00:35:18.559 --> 00:35:19.599 It's also interesting. 00:35:19.679 --> 00:35:23.119 He gets approached by the the Latin squad pretty quickly. 00:35:23.199 --> 00:35:26.320 They're basically like, yo, you're you're Latin, you got you're with us, right? 00:35:26.480 --> 00:35:28.239 And he kind of is like not he's like not, yeah. 00:35:28.320 --> 00:35:29.199 I'm not much of a joiner. 00:35:29.519 --> 00:35:37.519 Um, and what he ends up doing, who he does sort of join with, is everyone else who doesn't want to join, which is instead he takes his food outside instead of in the cafeteria. 00:35:37.840 --> 00:35:42.880 He walks way back into the back of the school, into like the semi- I didn't there's like a cemetery back there, goddamn. 00:35:42.960 --> 00:35:48.960 But um And it's all the freaks that are smoking, smoking weed and smoking cigarettes and like punks with their hair spiked. 00:35:49.039 --> 00:35:53.760 We got a emo girl, we got some black kids, they're all just out there vibing in the cemetery. 00:35:54.239 --> 00:36:03.920 He describes them, he says, you know, that these people usually congregate at the back of the school, the disenfranchised substance abusers, the freaks, the subculture elitists, those who in general don't mix well with others, my people. 00:36:04.320 --> 00:36:12.239 Um but yeah, so he goes back there and he ends up talking about talking to all these people about um what it is that they're trying to do, what it is that he's trying to accomplish. 00:36:12.400 --> 00:36:18.559 He uh ends up admitting to all of them that he he says, the piece of shit who ruined my life, I'm gonna kill Ronald Reagan. 00:36:18.639 --> 00:36:21.440 Um and it's kind of funny, they all think that he's super delusional. 00:36:21.599 --> 00:36:34.880 Um, you know, I'm sure that they all have their own things that they're delusional about, but they're kind of you know going back and forth about who's actually killed somebody, who's done this, um, you know, these people are gonna assassinate bankers, oil company executives, all that kind of stuff like that. 00:36:35.039 --> 00:36:36.400 What is Banana Rama? 00:36:36.960 --> 00:36:38.960 Where in what is the text? 00:36:39.280 --> 00:36:41.679 He says, Um, you know, you could change the world of the bullet. 00:36:41.760 --> 00:36:43.280 I plan on changing a proper bit of it. 00:36:43.519 --> 00:36:48.960 Lex and me were going to assassinate bankers, oil company executives, and then the guy in the background says banana rama. 00:36:49.039 --> 00:36:50.559 Don't forget bloody banana rama. 00:36:50.800 --> 00:36:52.559 And then they talk about making the world a better place. 00:36:52.639 --> 00:36:54.400 So now I feel like I have to look at banana rama. 00:36:55.679 --> 00:36:59.679 Um, that's a pop group? 00:36:59.920 --> 00:37:00.960 What the hell did they do? 00:37:01.039 --> 00:37:02.239 They're an Irish-English pop group. 00:37:02.559 --> 00:37:02.800 Oh, yeah. 00:37:02.880 --> 00:37:06.000 Well, this guy's supposed to be a pop, like I think he's supposed to be like a London punk. 00:37:06.400 --> 00:37:09.199 So he's he's like a sex, he's like a sex pistols guy or whatever. 00:37:09.360 --> 00:37:10.639 He's from that, he's from that scene. 00:37:10.719 --> 00:37:13.119 He's got the spiky, spiky short, bleached hair. 00:37:13.199 --> 00:37:14.800 He's got like the spiky leather jacket. 00:37:15.039 --> 00:37:15.840 That's hilarious. 00:37:15.920 --> 00:37:18.400 Uh, and this other guy looks like he's like a skinhead or something. 00:37:18.480 --> 00:37:25.440 Um I think this guy's like, I think he's just he's like, we gotta kill, we gotta kill these bloody pop stars in it. 00:37:25.599 --> 00:37:27.199 Yeah, we gotta kill him. 00:37:27.440 --> 00:37:28.960 I love I I love the accent. 00:37:29.039 --> 00:37:34.880 Yeah, but so that's they're talking about all the things that they're trying to accomplish, and then we get into our next period, fifth period, hand-to-hand combat. 00:37:35.119 --> 00:37:57.599 Marcus gets pulled out there with the teacher, he starts fighting, gets his ass kind of whooped, and then we end up seeing what leads into actually, I think, a big character moment for Marcus where um this guy who's kind of in the back of this class basically ends up kind of egging on a um sparring match between this guy who's very obviously like kind of like the bully of this um It's like a huge Russian guy. 00:37:57.760 --> 00:37:58.639 Yeah, huge Russian guy. 00:37:58.719 --> 00:37:59.360 He's kind of the bully. 00:37:59.440 --> 00:38:08.880 This guy in the background, this kind of like Chubby guy in the background, basically says something that leads to him, the Russian guy, having to go actually spar and and get his shit rocked, probably too. 00:38:08.960 --> 00:38:18.079 Um and then when Marcus is uh

basically getting dressed again in the uh locker room, interesting thing, we definitely see what I assume are a lot of burns. 00:38:18.480 --> 00:38:19.679 Burns and scars, yeah. 00:38:19.760 --> 00:38:21.199 Our main Marcus is covered. 00:38:21.599 --> 00:38:22.400 He's covered in them. 00:38:22.559 --> 00:38:29.519 Um and we see all the other boys have their clothes off too, so it's not just it's like showing again, whatever his crazy back homeless background is. 00:38:29.679 --> 00:38:32.400 He's been through a lot of a lot of violence and trauma of some kind. 00:38:32.719 --> 00:38:37.920 Right, and all these guys are basically beating the shit out of this um chubby kid who was saying stuff, whatever else before. 00:38:38.000 --> 00:38:41.280 Um, basically, you know, trying to teach him a lesson about keeping his mouth shut. 00:38:41.360 --> 00:38:49.199 Um but Marcus basically kind of stands up, not even I don't even know if it's necessarily like for the kid, he's just like, yo, you're stepping to me like fuck you. 00:38:49.280 --> 00:38:51.599 Like I'm not the guy to play with. 00:38:51.840 --> 00:38:58.000 Um and he ends up saying, This is kind of another one of these moments where Marcus says, you know, this doesn't end in a fist fight. 00:38:58.079 --> 00:39:01.119 You could probably beat me in a fist fight, but it ends with a knife in one of your eyes. 00:39:01.360 --> 00:39:01.599 Right. 00:39:01.760 --> 00:39:01.920 Right. 00:39:02.159 --> 00:39:03.119 It's crazy. 00:39:03.360 --> 00:39:04.800 This motherfucker's no joke. 00:39:05.119 --> 00:39:17.199 And then uh the kid that again, the sort of like subversion of heroic stuff, instead of the the the kid who's getting bullied just shits all over himself in the shower, and that's what ends up getting all the boys to leave him alone. 00:39:17.280 --> 00:39:18.559 Is he just shits. 00:39:18.800 --> 00:39:19.119 Yeah. 00:39:19.280 --> 00:39:20.880 And then, you know, we go through this. 00:39:21.119 --> 00:39:26.960 This is one of the parts where we actually learn about um all the different groups, the preps, the Dixie Mobs, Sotovatos, all these guys. 00:39:27.119 --> 00:39:45.599 We also get a little bit of like a weird I didn't understand exactly how this happened, but basically he gets um put into this uh AP black arts class, and the way that he gets basically selected for this is some person in a cloak like walks by and hands him this like little ornate box with like a I don't know, it's like the skeleton of like a rat inside it or something like that. 00:39:45.840 --> 00:39:47.920 And like a heart, like doesn't that look like a heart cover? 00:39:48.079 --> 00:39:48.559 It does or something. 00:39:48.880 --> 00:39:49.119 It does. 00:39:49.199 --> 00:39:53.039 I'm like, but anyway, it's like, oh, you know, you're someone must think very highly of you. 00:39:53.119 --> 00:39:55.199 So we're also learning again what other people think of Marcus. 00:39:55.280 --> 00:40:06.559 Not only do

the kids kind of want to fuck with him because they think that he's you know, he's hot shit for some reason, but um whoever is I think this is again his master Lynn who's putting in in these advanced classes. 00:40:06.880 --> 00:40:20.400 And I think people are interested because everyone else is like, oh yeah, my dad's it from this gang, my my mom is this assassin, like my family is involved with this, versus he's just someone who in the middle of the school year is just getting scooped off the streets and they're like, oh shit. 00:40:20.719 --> 00:40:21.679 Yep, yep, exactly. 00:40:21.760 --> 00:40:25.039 And so our last class here for the day is AP Black Arts. 00:40:25.199 --> 00:40:36.480 Um and uh this is all about the art of ritualistic execution, which is pretty interesting, and I do think that that'll definitely come back for probably the way that Marcus wants to do things in the end. 00:40:36.719 --> 00:40:42.320 But um there are a couple of guys that are making fun of him for what it is that he wants to do. 00:40:42.400 --> 00:40:46.719 And this teacher actually ends up standing up and saying, you know, you'd be wise to learn respect for a man's thirst for revenge. 00:40:46.800 --> 00:40:49.519 Uh it takes an iron resolve to actually follow through on that. 00:40:49.760 --> 00:40:53.039 So even the teacher here uh is standing up for him as well. 00:40:53.760 --> 00:40:58.719 But uh they get their first school assignment, yeah, which is absolutely wild. 00:40:58.880 --> 00:41:00.559 It's you have to kill someone. 00:41:01.119 --> 00:41:05.840 Tonight's assignment, you will see um uh he says revenge can fuel that resolve. 00:41:05.920 --> 00:41:15.039 As you will see on tonight's assignment, as you will see when you attempt to kill a vagrant, your victim must have committed some evil in life and earned this end. 00:41:15.199 --> 00:41:17.280 You will judge them and you will execute them. 00:41:17.360 --> 00:41:24.960 Ensure the vagabond is dead, take pictures, hide the body, and if you are caught, kill yourself, or one of your classmates will be sent to do so. 00:41:25.119 --> 00:41:25.599 Are we clear? 00:41:25.760 --> 00:41:26.639 No more laughing? 00:41:26.800 --> 00:41:27.039 Good. 00:41:27.119 --> 00:41:29.519 Have the assignment completed by tomorrow's class. 00:41:29.679 --> 00:41:31.199 Select your lab partner and go. 00:41:31.519 --> 00:41:32.000 Lab partner. 00:41:32.320 --> 00:41:32.800 Hilarious. 00:41:33.039 --> 00:41:34.639 So he's literally, I mean, that's crazy. 00:41:34.800 --> 00:41:44.719 Like the schoolwork they're getting is go stalk some homeless people, pick one who you can determine, like find some proof that they did something bad, and then kill them. 00:41:44.960 --> 00:41:45.360 Yep. 00:41:45.519 --> 00:41:48.239 Prove it, hide the body, get away with it. 00:41:48.559 --> 00:41:49.920 And uh by tomorrow. 00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:51.760 Yeah, by by tomorrow is crazy. 00:41:51.840 --> 00:42:05.599 And it's like, I mean, uh, who knows if it's day or night and down here, but this also sets up the first, I feel like, kind of friendship that Marcus uh ends up happening, which is with this kid Willie, the dude who's from South Central, who's kind of the leader of that um uh the game, what are they called? 00:42:05.679 --> 00:42:08.320 They're called the the final world order FWO. 00:42:08.559 --> 00:42:15.679 Um he basically says, you know, I don't know who here's got the nerve to pull this shit off, but my money's on you, my crazy new Nicaraguan lag partner, right? 00:42:15.760 --> 00:42:17.440 And so this is the beginning of their friendship. 00:42:17.599 --> 00:42:23.440 And then we get what I actually didn't even realize is at the beginning of this issue, we actually referenced this guy. 00:42:24.639 --> 00:42:26.079 I wasn't even I I had to piece it together. 00:42:26.159 --> 00:42:36.639 But anyway, so at the end of this issue, we see this police officer pulling up to this um farm in Oakland, uh, which I'd have to go check and see where the farms are in Oakland. 00:42:36.719 --> 00:42:38.239 I can't think of one off the top of my head. 00:42:38.400 --> 00:42:54.559 But anyway, farm in Oakland, um, he's hearing this ba of this sheep, Oakland Police Department, he yells and breaks in, and he looks in there, and we see this guy who's like patting one of the uh goats, I guess, in there. 00:42:54.880 --> 00:42:57.440 And very menacing, very menacingly. 00:42:57.519 --> 00:43:01.119 And the guy says, you know, I ain't hurting no one, officer, spreading some love. 00:43:01.360 --> 00:43:02.880 Wouldn't shoot a fellow for that, would you? 00:43:03.039 --> 00:43:05.920 Yeah, and this guy's got his belt buckle undone, bro. 00:43:06.239 --> 00:43:06.559 Yeah. 00:43:06.719 --> 00:43:08.400 We think this guy was fucking this goat. 00:43:08.559 --> 00:43:09.119 We're pretty sure. 00:43:09.599 --> 00:43:13.760 I think he was definitely fucking this goat, but he drops this whole load of bricks on this cop. 00:43:14.000 --> 00:43:23.440 Um and what he ends up asking this guy says, Rumor has it that the son of the bitch who torched the boys home a couple years back, and so we're learning that this is a kid that Marcus knew from before. 00:43:23.599 --> 00:43:24.960 This is definitely not a kid anymore. 00:43:25.119 --> 00:43:29.119 But he says, I got some personal feelings, you see, so you need to tell me everything you know about that homeless kid. 00:43:29.280 --> 00:43:37.440 And offer officer, if you think I was fucking that goat hard, wait till you see what I do to him, which is just a crazy fucking sentence. 00:43:37.760 --> 00:43:38.239 Insane. 00:43:38.480 --> 00:43:44.800 And then we get the we get the we get the look at him, we get this huge whole page shot of his face holding up this Polaroid of Marcus. 00:43:44.960 --> 00:43:47.440 Yep, and he is uh deformed and burned. 00:43:47.760 --> 00:43:49.039 Yeah, he's definitely gone through it. 00:43:49.360 -->

00:43:59.840 We can one of one of we can learn now, one of Marcus's past adventures was burning down a boy's home that he was living in and at least doing uh catastrophic burning. 00:44:00.239 --> 00:44:02.159 To this guy, at the very least. 00:44:02.400 --> 00:44:08.880 We also, uh uh Antonio's pointing out, the very this this uh chapter begins and ends with him. 00:44:08.960 --> 00:44:14.559 We got this uh flashback to um The Sunset Boys Home in 1986, so the year I guess before. 00:44:14.800 --> 00:44:16.719 Oh my god, and the kids jerking off looking at the dog. 00:44:18.800 --> 00:44:23.679 That was the shit where I was like, because when I first saw it, I was like, is he like and I was like, maybe he's just like chilling. 00:44:23.760 --> 00:44:26.320 Like, you know, some people just chill with their hands and their pants, whatever else, right? 00:44:26.400 --> 00:44:27.199 When you're lying down. 00:44:27.360 --> 00:44:30.000 But this kid is talking about this dog, basically like, good dog. 00:44:30.079 --> 00:44:31.280 I had a good dog like that. 00:44:31.519 --> 00:44:35.039 Dad took her away for a while, but she was a good dog, all this weird shit, whatever else, right? 00:44:35.440 --> 00:44:37.119 What the also it's it's crazy. 00:44:37.199 --> 00:44:42.880 He like says something to Marcus, being like, What are you doing over there, put pounding to this sweet dog show sound? 00:44:43.199 --> 00:44:43.519 Right? 00:44:43.679 --> 00:44:46.639 It's like he's almost making fun of I mean, this kid looks like a big thing. 00:44:46.960 --> 00:44:48.079 And Marcus is making a bomb. 00:44:48.239 --> 00:44:48.960 Yeah, he's making a bomb. 00:44:49.280 --> 00:44:50.639 We just we could put that together now. 00:44:50.719 --> 00:44:53.519 I didn't understand what he what that was uh when I read this paper. 00:44:53.760 --> 00:44:54.960 He's definitely making a bomb for sure. 00:44:55.119 --> 00:45:05.920 Yeah, so Marcus's arch nemesis seems to be this uh crazy fucking kid who bullies him and brags about jerking it to animals and fucking goats and shit. 00:45:06.239 --> 00:45:06.880 I don't know, bro. 00:45:06.960 --> 00:45:09.440 He sounds like the kind of guy that's they could probably kill. 00:45:09.599 --> 00:45:11.679 He could probably get away with that for sure at some point. 00:45:11.920 --> 00:45:12.159 Yep. 00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:13.199 We'll see. 00:45:13.440 --> 00:45:16.880 Uh but again, this is Tarantino-y, right? 00:45:17.199 --> 00:45:18.559 It's like it's it's kind of gross. 00:45:18.639 --> 00:45:20.719 Like, I'm not it's like, why are you putting this in here, bro? 00:45:21.280 --> 00:45:24.159 Like, why are you I know you're like which is I think is interesting. 00:45:24.239 --> 00:45:27.199 It's like I think Tarantino has some of that same energy in his movies. 00:45:27.280 --> 00:45:31.360 Uh like there's things that people really don't like about them, or yeah. 00:45:31.599 --> 00:45:38.800 Um, but again, it's like, hey, at least the author is uh going to such an extreme. 00:45:39.280 --> 00:45:44.800 Like there's things that we maybe don't like because he's swinging for the fences so hard. 00:45:45.119 --> 00:45:51.199 You know, he's like, this shit is gonna be gross and edgy and insane and violent, and if people fuck with it, they're gonna fuck with it. 00:45:51.280 --> 00:45:55.760 And like, I'm gonna do it that so hard, I'm gonna commit to such an extent that it might be off-putting. 00:45:56.000 --> 00:45:58.000 That's always the hard thing about art, right? 00:45:58.079 --> 00:45:59.119 How far do you go? 00:45:59.519 --> 00:46:00.880 Yeah, we feel that in in music. 00:46:00.960 --> 00:46:06.960 All I mean, especially both of our lanes that we work in mostly is sort of uh like pop, hip hop, adjacent type stuff. 00:46:07.199 --> 00:46:10.159 We're definitely trying to find stuff that it will appeal to people. 00:46:10.320 --> 00:46:13.679 That's one of the things that we're considering while we're making the art. 00:46:13.840 --> 00:46:18.239 Um But sometimes you also make art that's like you just are not sure if people are gonna like it. 00:46:18.400 --> 00:46:21.760 And that's that's kind of like one of the beauties of art in general. 00:46:21.840 --> 00:46:28.000 It's like that moment where you put something out in the world and it just you just have to accept that people are gonna see it for what it is that they see it as. 00:46:28.320 --> 00:46:28.800 Yep. 00:46:29.119 --> 00:46:30.960 Everyone gets to interpret it. 00:46:31.519 --> 00:46:33.119 Um we're that yeah, anyway. 00:46:33.199 --> 00:46:33.360 All right. 00:46:33.599 --> 00:46:34.400 Sorry, my fault, my fault. 00:46:34.719 --> 00:46:35.119 No, no, no. 00:46:35.199 --> 00:46:35.679 Issue number two. 00:46:35.840 --> 00:46:39.119 Issue number three, we're into now, deadly class issue number three. 00:46:39.280 --> 00:46:51.199 So we've got a couple of new characters, we've got um our kind of main antagonist, right, set up for what's gonna be going on in the story, and now we're getting into um Marcus and Willie going on to complete this assignment. 00:46:51.280 --> 00:46:54.559 So Marcus and Willie go into San Francisco to complete their assignment. 00:46:54.639 --> 00:47:01.679 Um, when it's time to actually do this thing, Willie actually ends up freezing and doesn't kill him, he doesn't pull the trigger. 00:47:01.840 --> 00:47:13.519 Um, and he goes on actually later on to reveal that his kind of whole backstory, which he talks about in this, where he supposedly killed five guys before he was 12 because they killed his dad, we end up learning that that's actually a lie. 00:47:13.760 --> 00:47:19.840 Um and desperate not to uh fail out of King's Dominion, Marcus actually ends up killing this homeless guy that he knows. 00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:37.599 This guy's name is Rory, after Rory kind of casually ends up admitting that um to these atrocities in Vietnam, and we'll get into it a little bit, but

Rory basically tries to pin it on this other homeless guy, and that's when Willie freezes, and then Rory ends up telling them um kind of I don't know if it's accidentally or whatever else, but he ends up telling them about Vietnam. 00:47:37.920 --> 00:47:44.400 And this issue kind of ends up showing that Marcus, when he's like pushed into a corner, feels trapped, feels whatever else, right? 00:47:44.559 --> 00:47:58.000 One of his big things is that he doesn't want to go back to sleeping uh and uh in the streets and being homeless, um, is that he is willing to kill this guy who he knows, who when they go to this area and he's asking this guy for information, this guy knows him. 00:47:58.239 --> 00:48:02.159 They've you know, it seems like he's you know dealt him drugs or whatever else before. 00:48:02.239 --> 00:48:06.880 Um, this guy recognizes him and and Marcus is still willing to make the choice in the end. 00:48:07.280 --> 00:48:22.000 Um so this starts off with this kind of uh fun like ninja scene of them like running across like uh the top of buildings, and it's kind of this interesting moment where I first actually started realizing that maybe Willie's not like who he says that he is. 00:48:22.079 --> 00:48:40.159 Um Marcus and Willie are jumping across this um this building gap, and Marcus has done this a bunch before, um, or at least he's uh he says that he's jumped before, and he ends up uh basically betting Willie, and Marcus makes it and Willie almost doesn't, or he doesn't, I guess really, and Marcus has to pull him back up and save him. 00:48:40.400 --> 00:48:44.400 And Willie is like super scared, he's like crying, don't let me die, all this stuff like that. 00:48:44.559 --> 00:48:45.679 He saves him. 00:48:45.920 --> 00:48:52.159 Um and we basically end up learning later on what uh Willie's backstory is. 00:48:52.239 --> 00:49:07.679 We also get a lot of I think interesting character moments about um Marcus here, um, where he goes on to basically say, uh I mean he says a I'm trying to think of where even the best place to start is here, but he basically actually ends up talking about his anxiety, which is I think is a very interesting thing. 00:49:07.840 --> 00:49:09.519 Um says it's me, my anxiety. 00:49:09.599 --> 00:49:14.880 I do this thing after I'm around people where I obsessively overanalyze every interaction to see where I went wrong or who I offended. 00:49:15.199 --> 00:49:19.039 Um Willie goes on to call this emotional paranoia, is what his therapist at home called it. 00:49:19.119 --> 00:49:20.400 So or therapist in the home. 00:49:20.559 --> 00:49:30.800 Funny that they even have therapists, but he goes on to say, uh Marcus says, I sit up at every night, I didn't uh worrying, I didn't catch the cues or I said the wrong things, trying to figure out why I never fit in anywhere. 00:49:30.960 --> 00:49:33.280 Um it's funny, Willie says, damn, you are crazy, right? 00:49:33.360 --> 00:49:35.599 Um and Marcus is mine, everybody else is crazy. 00:49:35.760 --> 00:49:44.400 And he goes on to this kind of tangent here, basically saying that um he believes that all this polite human interaction is all just manipulation to get what people want from each other. 00:49:44.480 --> 00:49:46.800 And Willie kind of takes that in a funny way personally. 00:49:46.880 --> 00:49:48.719 He's like, You're just like being nice to me to be my friend. 00:49:48.800 --> 00:49:54.079 And Marcus is kind of like, yeah, bro, like um, you know, that's just like what people do. 00:49:54.239 --> 00:49:57.039 Uh and I don't know, it's interesting. 00:49:57.440 --> 00:49:58.159 It is really interesting. 00:49:58.239 --> 00:50:03.440 Uh part of what it wants us to be examining is if he is like a psychopath or not, right? 00:50:03.519 --> 00:50:04.239 Or a sociopath. 00:50:04.559 --> 00:50:06.239 What's the what's the right what's the well? 00:50:06.400 --> 00:50:17.840 So neither of these things, uh and uh the reason we'll talk about this too is because uh uh my my degree is in psychology, but neither of these things are actually in the DSM V, which is like the psychological manual, it's all under antisocial personality disorder. 00:50:18.000 --> 00:50:18.400 Oh, wow. 00:50:18.639 --> 00:50:27.920 Um yeah, so like psychopath and and sociopath are not technically scientific terms for what this stuff is, at least not in the sense of the DSM five and psychological. 00:50:28.079 --> 00:50:32.559 Like more like they're not real, they're they're like colloquialism sort of for antisocial personality disorder. 00:50:32.880 --> 00:50:42.000 Which basically just means like you don't you don't relate you don't experience uh you don't you you just don't experience your uh existence in the same through these same parameters that other people. 00:50:42.400 --> 00:50:57.039 Right, and there's a lot of like like when it comes to like a psychopath or a sociopath, and it's funny, Ben and I were just talking about this teacher that I had actually a little while ago before we started the pod, but there are these checklists um that they use for kind of determining whether or not somebody would be kind of falling into that like psychopath territory. 00:50:57.119 --> 00:50:59.039 And there's this checklist that's called the PCLR. 00:50:59.119 --> 00:51:04.480 It's a bunch of these questions, and you basically rate um, this goes on, this is not something that you could do in a short sitting. 00:51:04.559 --> 00:51:09.840 You'd basically be with, you know, you could imagine a therapist in like a prison or something like that, working with somebody over months and months and months. 00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:15.519 But they basically give all of these questions a score of a zero or one or a two uh based on severity zeros, right? 00:51:15.599 --> 00:51:18.000 It does is absence and two is that it's very much there. 00:51:18.159 --> 00:51:21.119 And a lot of these things are like callousness, right? 00:51:21.280 -->

00:51:25.039 You're um uh a zero sum game, right? 00:51:25.119 --> 00:51:29.039 So viewing life is basically like if somebody else gets something, you're losing something, right? 00:51:29.119 --> 00:51:31.119 Or if you get something, somebody else is losing something. 00:51:31.199 --> 00:51:32.320 That's also part of this kind of stuff. 00:51:32.400 --> 00:51:36.079 There's a lot of different things here, like not being able to hold down a job. 00:51:36.239 --> 00:51:46.800 Um, in the old version of this test, back in kind of actually this time period, it would have been like having like a bunch of um marital partners back to back, or like a bunch of people that you've dated back to back to back to back. 00:51:46.960 --> 00:51:50.880 Nowadays it's kind of more so like sexual partners just because of the way that things have changed. 00:51:51.119 --> 00:51:59.119 But you know, one thing that you could say here, right, is that we're seeing that Marcus feels this kind of like disconnect very much with other people, right? 00:51:59.360 --> 00:52:08.960 And he also understand what like I've talked to, I mean, I have friends that are uh, you know, people in my life that are spectrum or spectrum adjacent or whatever. 00:52:09.039 --> 00:52:21.119 And some it's like reminds me of some conversations with them where they're just trying to, they're just trying to understand like what other people just do are doing naturally and they couldn't even necessarily articulate why they feel these ways or why they are interacting with people in a certain way. 00:52:21.280 --> 00:52:24.480 For some people, they're like they're literally just trying to unpack it, they're trying to understand it. 00:52:24.639 --> 00:52:26.320 They're like, that's what am I supposed to do? 00:52:26.480 --> 00:52:27.360 How am I supposed to be acting right? 00:52:27.599 --> 00:52:27.760 Exactly. 00:52:27.840 --> 00:52:30.880 And so Marcus is kind of experiencing this in a different kind of way. 00:52:30.960 --> 00:52:36.480 And one of the other things that he says here, right, which is very telling, is that he says all polite human interaction is all just a manipulation, right? 00:52:36.639 --> 00:52:50.320 It's like he that's the way that he views niceness, kindness in general to him, because the experiences that he's had is just people trying to use those words, use those things to get something from somebody else, right? 00:52:50.559 --> 00:52:59.599 So we're learning a lot of his uh I think kind of this the psychology that has been brought upon him through difficult childhoods. 00:52:59.679 --> 00:53:02.239 And this is a lot of where we end up seeing these these kinds of things. 00:53:02.320 --> 00:53:05.920 People talk about stuff like being young with a dark triad, all these different kind of things like that. 00:53:06.079 --> 00:53:08.400 But anyway, yeah, it's important. 00:53:08.639 --> 00:53:12.159 I mean, yeah, it's it's cool, it's cool stuff for the story to be examining, you

know. 00:53:12.400 --> 00:53:15.119 It's also then then classic Willie's response to this, right? 00:53:15.199 --> 00:53:17.360 So Marcus kind of is a little vulnerable. 00:53:17.599 --> 00:53:24.000 I mean, it's can be interpreted as him being callous, but he's kind of basically being like, Look, man, I really struggle with like connecting with people. 00:53:24.079 --> 00:53:25.440 Yeah, I don't know how to interpret it. 00:53:25.519 --> 00:53:29.679 I'm you like we're trying to be boys, like I'm hard for me to figure this out. 00:53:29.840 --> 00:53:32.960 And Willie's like, fuck you, you don't know shit about me. 00:53:33.360 --> 00:53:36.320 Yeah, um, he's like, fuck you, you're just being civil to be my friend. 00:53:36.480 --> 00:53:41.519 I capped five hardcores before my 12th birthday in my own house after they murdered my pops in front of me. 00:53:41.679 --> 00:53:44.239 Ain't no mystery why you ain't got no friends, motherfucker. 00:53:44.400 --> 00:53:47.440 Yeah, like he's really just like, fuck you, I'm the shit. 00:53:47.679 --> 00:53:50.159 And his other thing is that he says that nobody likes honesty, right? 00:53:50.239 --> 00:53:56.480 And that's kind of the funny thing about Marcus too, is that with some of these people, right, they they view like like that this is their callousness, right? 00:53:56.559 --> 00:53:58.320 Like they they view that as like honesty, right? 00:53:58.400 --> 00:54:02.000 It's like I'm not I'm not being a dick to you, but I'm just being honest with you. 00:54:02.320 --> 00:54:05.519 But you know, with most people that are not like this, right? 00:54:05.599 --> 00:54:09.920 We understand the social cues of like you can be honest with somebody and also not be an asshole. 00:54:10.000 --> 00:54:14.079 And there's a you know balance there that ends up being struck, and Marcus is like, fuck that shit, right? 00:54:14.400 --> 00:54:24.079 But honesty and authenticity are some of the most difficult things for us to be expressing, you know, it's uh it's this is all you know interesting human relation stuff, right? 00:54:24.159 --> 00:54:26.880 The next page talks about this in art in a in an interesting way. 00:54:26.960 --> 00:54:30.880 So we see Marcus has his headphones on, um, and he's like really, really vibing out. 00:54:30.960 --> 00:54:32.639 And Willie's like, yo, what are you listening to? 00:54:32.800 --> 00:54:36.800 He says the Smiths says, Ah man, that depressing shit, sort of gay, isn't it? 00:54:36.960 --> 00:54:44.880 And Marcus is like, if by gay you mean brave and honest, um, I don't know, it's hard to express honest emotions and be fearless about sadness. 00:54:45.039 --> 00:54:51.039 Most people walk around hiding it as if it's a weakness, acting tough as if they can fool people into seeing them as something they aren't. 00:54:51.119 --> 00:54:53.440 It's braver to be honest than to pretend. 00:54:53.599 --> 00:54:56.480 Uh acting hard, what good is that? 00:54:56.719 --> 00:55:03.039 And

this is so fascinating now that like once we later get this context about Willie's background, because this is probably hitting crazy home. 00:55:03.280 --> 00:55:03.679 Yeah, for him. 00:55:04.159 --> 00:55:04.480 For him. 00:55:04.719 --> 00:55:06.800 But it's interesting, you know, it's just this is real now. 00:55:06.880 --> 00:55:10.000 Like it's some of the bravest shit is people being the most themselves. 00:55:10.320 --> 00:55:12.079 Yeah, I think that's I think that's true. 00:55:12.400 --> 00:55:26.159 It's crazy the extent to which we all just get shaped by what's around us, and also how many people in their lives just sort of even subconsciously just submit to the environments they're in and just like get taken in different directions versus uh living. 00:55:26.639 --> 00:55:28.880 I mean, this is like this is one of like the big questions. 00:55:29.039 --> 00:55:34.320 It's kind of funny you talk about just like growing up, but this is one of the big questions of psychology is this nature versus nurture, right? 00:55:34.400 --> 00:55:43.280 It's like how much how much of who you are is kind of what you're born with, and how much of who you are is what is kind of developed through the experiences that you have. 00:55:43.519 --> 00:55:45.920 And I mean, in my opinion, I think it's definitely both of these things for sure. 00:55:46.079 --> 00:55:58.960 And I think that that's kind of the general opinion that there are you know pieces that come from each, but you know, what we're seeing here with with Marcus, and they kind of go on to talk about reputation, where kind of like what you're saying, Willie is like, you know, his response to Marcus being like, What good is acting hard? 00:55:59.119 --> 00:56:02.880 Willie's like reputation, you ain't got a rep, people are gonna see you as weak, and they come at you, right? 00:56:03.039 --> 00:56:04.880 And it's funny, I actually kind of love what Marcus says here. 00:56:04.960 --> 00:56:05.679 It's kind of this funny thing. 00:56:05.760 --> 00:56:08.639 He says, Better expose your ankles and see which snakes bite. 00:56:08.880 --> 00:56:12.639 Um and then Willie says, you know, he says, Well, let me save you some time at this school. 00:56:12.719 --> 00:56:15.039 Like, everybody bites, everybody's a snake. 00:56:15.280 --> 00:56:16.880 And Willie's response to is interesting. 00:56:16.960 --> 00:56:21.039 It's not just like Marcus has it figured out and Willie doesn't, it's like they have different different takes on it, right? 00:56:21.119 --> 00:56:24.719 Like Willie's Willie says, Um, you know, the whole thing is about reputation. 00:56:24.880 --> 00:56:28.320 Um, if you wink out a rep, people see you as weak and they come at you. 00:56:28.480 --> 00:56:32.480 Um, which is, you know, is the and then Marcus' response about the snake bites thing, right? 00:56:32.559 --> 00:56:34.400 But it also he's talking about it in terms of the music he likes. 00:56:34.480 --> 00:56:36.400 Like he's like, You need to you need to get into hip hop. 00:56:36.480 --> 00:56:36.639 Yeah. 00:56:36.719 --> 00:56:38.079 And he's like, nah, that's old shit. 00:56:38.159 --> 00:56:39.039 Um, you need new science. 00:56:39.199 --> 00:56:42.320 You heard Eric B and Rakim, Public Enemy, L Cool, J Super So. 00:56:42.880 --> 00:56:43.599 That was some new shit, bro. 00:56:43.679 --> 00:56:44.800 Eric B and Rakim. 00:56:44.880 --> 00:56:45.679 That was some crazy shit. 00:56:45.920 --> 00:56:50.719 But then this is interesting where where then they're smoking a joint and having this conversation, which is which is fire. 00:56:50.880 --> 00:56:54.960 Um just shout out bonding with people to discussing art that you love over a J. 00:56:55.280 --> 00:56:55.760 Over a J. 00:56:56.000 --> 00:56:57.599 That's like that's a hack for life. 00:56:57.920 --> 00:56:58.320 Yeah, it is. 00:56:58.880 --> 00:57:04.079 Um, so if you're one of those people who quit like so you're one of those people who quits bands when they aren't popular anymore. 00:57:04.159 --> 00:57:11.679 Uh so you're trendy, you need to follow the trends other people dictate to you, like uh the girls in those leg warmers, which is interesting pop criticism, right? 00:57:11.760 --> 00:57:14.079 And then Willie's like, nah, I just like the new shit, man. 00:57:14.239 --> 00:57:15.199 Um enough of this. 00:57:15.280 --> 00:57:21.280 Uh what do I care what you listen to and where the hell you're taking um uh and where the hell you're taking me. 00:57:21.440 --> 00:57:31.920 Uh he he likes being up to date, and Marcus sees it as you just abandon following trends, versus he's like, no, I'm interested in the new. 00:57:32.079 --> 00:57:39.360 I'm always trying to understand what the be able to feel what's coming, you know, predict what the current like understand the now. 00:57:39.519 --> 00:57:39.679 Right. 00:57:39.840 --> 00:57:46.800 And I definitely relate to that in some ways where like I listen, like in my music consumption, especially back when I used to DJ full-time, right? 00:57:46.880 --> 00:57:49.679 It was like I had like everything that came out, I had to listen through at once. 00:57:49.760 --> 00:57:49.920 Right. 00:57:50.079 --> 00:57:55.119 And then I did and then I'm building a mental model of music, yeah, right? 00:57:55.199 --> 00:57:57.599 Of like of current music, what people are trying to listen to, right? 00:57:57.679 --> 00:58:04.000 And that's a different component than just seeking out what most relates to you and your own experience, and then listening to that. 00:58:04.159 --> 00:58:11.119 It's like you're kind of listening for what is most voicing the experience of the zeitgeist of everybody right now. 00:58:11.280 --> 00:58:13.519 You know, it's an interesting psychology. 00:58:13.760 --> 00:58:16.239 I don't know if I don't know if I articulated that makes sense well at all. 00:58:16.480 --> 00:58:17.280 Well, it makes sense to me. 00:58:17.360 --> 00:58:19.119 If you guys

didn't understand, you will. 00:58:19.360 --> 00:58:19.679 You will. 00:58:19.840 --> 00:58:20.639 Um, psychology. 00:58:20.800 --> 00:58:23.440 My understanding with all this stuff is I think that psychology is everything. 00:58:23.599 --> 00:58:26.639 Everything involves psychology, the way people think, the way they act, the way whatever else. 00:58:26.800 --> 00:58:36.559 But anyway, this next part of this here, they go to this homeless encampment under this bridge, and this is where Marcus runs into this guy, Rory, who he knows, and he this guy asks him how he's been, right? 00:58:36.639 --> 00:58:39.280 This is, I think, another great contextual thing for what happens later. 00:58:39.440 --> 00:58:41.599 This guy asks Marcus how he's been. 00:58:41.840 --> 00:58:43.760 They kind of catch up, shoot the shit. 00:58:43.840 --> 00:58:48.000 This guy also warns him about the guy who is coming after him. 00:58:48.079 --> 00:58:49.920 That's from um the the boys home. 00:58:50.000 --> 00:58:54.400 He says, you know, uh, monster with no face came through camp, and Marcus is like, no face. 00:58:54.559 --> 00:58:56.800 And he says, Um, what I say wasn't anything I'd call a face. 00:58:56.960 --> 00:58:58.239 Stirred up the locals, gave us some terror. 00:58:58.320 --> 00:58:59.039 I know bad energy. 00:58:59.119 --> 00:59:04.320 I certainly know the foremost face of Satan, which is pretty, pretty fucking crazy thing to say. 00:59:04.559 --> 00:59:14.960 Um, and then uh this guy also Rory ends up telling him uh basically this guy used to tell Marcus stories, which is another, again, crazy thing for how this ends. 00:59:15.119 --> 00:59:24.719 But this guy used to tell Marcus stories of this guy who um I suppose this guy knew from Nom who had uh you know women and children burned alive, all this kind of stuff. 00:59:24.800 --> 00:59:28.400 And so Marcus and Willie go to hunt down this guy. 00:59:28.559 --> 00:59:30.320 Um the guy jumps out with a knife. 00:59:30.480 --> 00:59:38.639 Marcus actually ends up realizing it's the same guy who stole his shoes before, and there's this moment where Willie has a chance to shoot and kill this guy, and he doesn't. 00:59:38.719 --> 00:59:43.920 He actually has multiple moments, and they make that very that's shown again throughout these panels. 00:59:44.159 --> 00:59:50.800 Um and I'm actually sorry, I'm just looking at the way that all the the um brick and stuff like that bend as this guy is running away. 00:59:50.880 --> 00:59:56.719 But um, because it's like his anxiety and like everything's distorting the way time is moving differently. 00:59:56.960 --> 00:59:57.199 Exactly. 00:59:57.280 --> 00:59:58.400 It's all kind of like slow momentum. 00:59:58.480 --> 01:00:03.119 There's so many moments that he had, and again, he it shows a lot of things about Willie here. 01:00:03.199 --> 01:00:10.079 One, he doesn't shoot, and then he throws the gun afterwards, which just crazy amateur, not yeah, not gun safety at all. 01:00:10.159 --> 01:00:13.920 And the gun goes off and almost shoots Marcus's Marcus in the head. 01:00:14.079 --> 01:00:19.119 Um, and then Willie goes on to admit he says, I'm no killer, and uh he says, you know, what about all this stuff with your dad? 01:00:19.199 --> 01:00:20.880 And he says it was true, but not like I said it. 01:00:20.960 --> 01:00:26.719 Basically, the these guys ended up coming into Willie's home and and they did kill his dad, shot him so many times in front of him. 01:00:26.880 --> 01:00:33.039 Um, and then uh his uncle basically actually ended up showing up, and um it is his uncle, right? 01:00:33.280 --> 01:00:34.960 Yeah, his uncle uh killed those guys. 01:00:35.199 --> 01:00:45.519 His uncle killed those guys and basically gave uh Willie the gun and said, You gotta take it and so you can have some credit and and some rep and be safe on the streets and shit like that now with whatever goes on. 01:00:45.760 --> 01:00:50.400 Um and it's crazy because Willie's crying through this and whatever else, and it's interesting. 01:00:50.559 --> 01:00:57.679 Marcus understands, he says, you know, you know, I you were just a kid, a kid who drew a bad hand, nothing to be ashamed of, I'm no different. 01:00:57.840 --> 01:01:04.480 Um and we also see that the same guy interesting thing about this guy too, this guy is like the the I'm talking about the guy, the faceless guy who's chasing after him. 01:01:04.639 --> 01:01:06.639 This dude is like super homophobic for no reason. 01:01:06.800 --> 01:01:11.119 Like he I mean, sure there's some reason whatever else, but he keeps calling all these guys like the F-word and whatever else. 01:01:11.199 --> 01:01:20.400 He calls Marcus an F word the F-word when he's um with him in the boys uh the boys' home, then he calls both these guys the F-word when they're having this emotional talk together. 01:01:20.639 --> 01:01:23.599 Um so I don't know if that's gonna be something that comes up later on. 01:01:23.679 --> 01:01:25.119 Maybe it's just a thing for the time. 01:01:25.360 --> 01:01:32.800 Um also obviously San Francisco is a very big LGBTQ center, so there's maybe some kind of interesting stuff that could go on later on with that. 01:01:32.960 --> 01:01:37.679 But um we're learning a lot about Willie, and then we go back to uh Rory. 01:01:37.920 --> 01:01:46.079 They sit down and end up talking with him, and I don't know, Ben, if you want to take kind of what uh goes on with this, but unlucky. 01:01:46.400 --> 01:01:51.760 Yeah, I mean, basically Rory is uh, you know, he's the homeless friend of Marcus's, right? 01:01:51.840 --> 01:01:54.239 Uh they're at least they had some kind of rapport or whatever. 01:01:54.320 --> 01:01:56.639 Um they grew up around him at the very least, yeah. 01:01:56.800 --> 01:01:57.039 Yeah. 01:01:57.519 --> 01:01:59.199 Uh but basically they share food. 01:01:59.280 --> 01:02:06.159 He gives him f uh like expired, expired chili from a can, which Marcus is

eating, and Willie's like, that's disgusting. 01:02:06.320 --> 01:02:06.559 Yeah. 01:02:06.719 --> 01:02:09.199 Um he talks about being in Vietnam. 01:02:09.360 --> 01:02:13.760 Um basically says, let's see, let's find some good stuff. 01:02:14.000 --> 01:02:17.920 Um I most uh Willie asks him, How did you end up out here? 01:02:18.079 --> 01:02:20.559 And he says, I watched most of my friends die in Nam. 01:02:20.719 --> 01:02:22.639 I lost my little girl to a car wreck while I was over there. 01:02:22.800 --> 01:02:24.960 Came home to Venom, people cursing and spitting. 01:02:25.199 --> 01:02:26.800 Parents died not too long after that. 01:02:26.960 --> 01:02:28.800 But you know, it's impossible to describe it all. 01:02:28.880 --> 01:02:30.239 It just broke me, broke my soul. 01:02:30.320 --> 01:02:34.880 And when you go through shit like that, Zippo Torch a Village, well, that shit don't ever leave you. 01:02:35.119 --> 01:02:38.559 And it shows this picture of them in Vietnam, and it's him and their boys. 01:02:38.639 --> 01:02:50.400 It's this they're even younger looking than Marcus and Willie, which is really again part of what I think there's like parallels between what was going on in Vietnam and the ridiculousness of this school for assassins, right? 01:02:50.480 --> 01:02:50.639 Right. 01:02:50.800 --> 01:02:53.920 Where we go, oh what, Hogwarts for kids doing murder? 01:02:54.000 --> 01:02:54.480 That's stupid. 01:02:54.639 --> 01:02:55.679 And then it's like, oh, that's yeah. 01:02:56.000 --> 01:02:59.199 That's actually such a great, great point that you're making right there. 01:02:59.280 --> 01:03:10.239 I mean, that like this school is going into the you know especially us us being Americans, like we we were we were sending people to die before they were allowed to drink. 01:03:10.400 --> 01:03:10.800 Yep. 01:03:11.360 --> 01:03:13.119 Uh what are we talking about? 01:03:13.360 --> 01:03:16.159 Yeah, there's something, there's something broken, there's something wrong there. 01:03:16.320 --> 01:03:17.599 But they have this conversation. 01:03:18.480 --> 01:03:19.199 Like, what the hell? 01:03:19.280 --> 01:03:22.719 It that's goofy, like that's goofy like Assassin Hogwarts. 01:03:22.880 --> 01:03:23.760 Yes, it exactly. 01:03:23.840 --> 01:03:25.599 It is goofy like Assassin Hogwarts. 01:03:25.760 --> 01:03:28.559 Um also shout out this guy's wearing a San Francisco Giants hat. 01:03:28.639 --> 01:03:30.320 We're definitely we're we're in the place. 01:03:30.559 --> 01:03:35.519 But um, Marcus says that he has to go take a piss, and then uh Rory is telling Willie some more stuff. 01:03:35.599 --> 01:03:39.119 He says, you know, I ain't got shit going for me, no skills, sort of done my ugliest in. 01:03:39.280 --> 01:03:41.199 Hell, face like Marcus says, I could have done something. 01:03:41.360 --> 01:03:42.960 So he's he's complimenting Marcus. 01:03:43.039 --> 01:03:46.000 Um, and then he says, But I sure I know pretty boy like you, pretty boy. 01:03:46.079 --> 01:03:57.599 And we get this first moment of uh maybe not the first moment, but the first moment of this part of Marcus's trauma, where we see somebody touching his hair and his head as a kid saying, Such a pretty boy. 01:03:57.760 --> 01:04:02.480 And so what I assume is going on here is definitely some either molestation or something like that in Marcus's past. 01:04:02.559 --> 01:04:04.400 Um and it really sets him off. 01:04:04.559 --> 01:04:12.159 He's hearing these stories about Vietnam and he's he's getting upset, and then this guy Rory is saying, I can still remember life before the war, sunny, normal, perfect. 01:04:12.239 --> 01:04:13.760 I just never knew what I had until it was gone. 01:04:13.840 --> 01:04:21.679 And we see in the background, Marcus is coming up behind him, and Marcus swings this metal pole and kills this guy, Rory, right in front of Willie. 01:04:21.840 --> 01:04:24.000 And we see again, Willie is like distraught by this. 01:04:24.079 --> 01:04:26.079 This is not like his everyday. 01:04:26.159 --> 01:04:28.079 He's at the school for assassins, but it's not his thing. 01:04:28.320 --> 01:04:29.440 Willie couldn't pull a trigger. 01:04:29.519 --> 01:04:32.239 Marcus just beat someone to death with a metal rod. 01:04:32.559 --> 01:04:41.199 Yeah, he doesn't even just hit him one eye, he hits him hard like from the side one time, and then he smashes down on him again, and this guy's lying in the pool of the blood, and Marcus just says one thing. 01:04:41.280 --> 01:04:43.039 He says, We got nowhere else to go. 01:04:43.199 --> 01:04:52.239 And then we get this crazy, and then this is actually what I described to Ben, it feels like the ending of like a TV episode or whatever else, where we see this kind of zoom out of like the moment, it gets further away. 01:04:52.480 --> 01:05:04.480 We see also the American flag in this as well, which I think is definitely like a kind of again that that um metaphor of the school of assassins versus like you know being in the military, whatever else, right? 01:05:04.559 --> 01:05:16.079 Uh, I think it's definitely being shown here, at least in the US military, and then we zoom out, we get this great moment of um again being in San Francisco, we see the bridge, um, and that uh is what wraps up issue number three. 01:05:16.239 --> 01:05:18.639 Um the boys did their homework assignment. 01:05:18.880 --> 01:05:21.440 They did do their homework assignment, uh, as far as we know. 01:05:21.599 --> 01:05:23.360 And um, I mean I remember reading that, bro. 01:05:23.519 --> 01:05:25.760 I did not think he was just gonna whack him like that. 01:05:25.840 --> 01:05:28.880 I was not, I was like, my mouth was open when I was actually reading that part. 01:05:29.039 --> 01:05:32.800 And it's it's um it's it's tough, bro. 01:05:32.880 --> 01:05:42.000 And it's also just like I think it also just upset Marcus because this guy obviously had like lied to him his

whole life about who actually did these terrible things in Vietnam. 01:05:42.159 --> 01:05:50.880 Um Right, which we get in the in in the next issues, we're gonna we're gonna wrap it up here um for now and just do this little little three issue conversation. 01:05:50.960 --> 01:05:57.920 Um but yeah, we do we do get a little more context later on about uh Marcus's decision here. 01:05:58.159 --> 01:05:58.559 Yes. 01:05:58.800 --> 01:06:10.800 Um but it It um you know, I think a lot, like you're saying, it's it's really dope how much psych type conversation we can have through this. 01:06:10.960 --> 01:06:11.199 Yeah. 01:06:11.280 --> 01:06:11.760 It's everything. 01:06:11.920 --> 01:06:20.320 It's a cool, there's a lot, like Deadly Class is really uh like the themes that it's trying to discuss are cool. 01:06:20.639 --> 01:06:22.960 And the art is incredible. 01:06:23.199 --> 01:06:26.320 Yeah, it's I mean this is a very thoughtful, this is a thoughtful book. 01:06:26.400 --> 01:06:32.159 And I think I mean this I think is another one that uh it lends itself to actually conversations like this, right? 01:06:32.239 --> 01:06:46.079 It's like there's a lot of things I think in here that some of the things that make them so I think fun and interesting for us is the fact that we do get to talk about them and explore them in a deeper way and bring in stuff about either psychology or about you know what we know about the military and things like that. 01:06:46.239 --> 01:06:51.280 And um it's cool to find these like deeper meanings to everything that's going on here, right? 01:06:51.360 --> 01:06:54.480 Other than a cool story, just being alive, relating to people. 01:06:54.719 --> 01:06:55.039 Yeah. 01:06:55.280 --> 01:06:58.320 Um yeah, I mean these stories too. 01:06:58.400 --> 01:07:15.360 I think maybe if you guys are thinking about what type of like if you want to dive into this and check it out, maybe one thing I could say is it's definitely seems, even having read a little bit more, uh, the type of story where you're not necessarily supposed to be like in love or super relate to your protagonists necessarily. 01:07:15.519 --> 01:07:28.960 It's more on on that sort of like Game of Thrones line where everything, everybody is gray to such different extents that it's more sort of like picking and choosing what you know, you like you just like moments. 01:07:29.119 --> 01:07:40.800 Yeah, you relate to not even people, it's like moments that you relate to, and and that may extend to the person, but you know or also characters that you like you root for characters in super in certain contexts, right? 01:07:40.960 --> 01:07:43.840 But you they're bad people the whole time, you know. 01:07:44.079 --> 01:07:46.960 Even in comedy, sometimes like uh like always sunny or something, you know. 01:07:47.039 --> 01:07:49.440 Like some people just don't, they're like, What? 01:07:49.599 --> 01:08:00.559 Like this show is endorsing what you know, you're like, no,

you're supposed to hate all the main like you love them, but like you're not supposed to like they're making they're not supposed to be role models, no, yeah. 01:08:01.280 --> 01:08:05.519 The point of this is to laugh at their evil and stupidity. 01:08:05.840 --> 01:08:06.800 Like how bad they are, right? 01:08:06.880 --> 01:08:08.000 Exactly, all that kind of stuff. 01:08:08.079 --> 01:08:18.720 So I think there's some I mean, obviously, I think we will, as we get to know our protagonists more, we're gonna relate to them more, we're gonna like them more, but it's also like you know, Marcus is a fucking bastard. 01:08:18.880 --> 01:08:20.479 It's yeah, he's he's hardcore. 01:08:20.560 --> 01:08:22.239 I mean he's been through, clearly been through. 01:08:22.479 --> 01:08:29.600 He's been through some shit and it's hardened him into a person that is willing to do whatever it takes to keep moving. 01:08:29.840 --> 01:08:35.439 Right, which again circles back to your uh um why am I blanking on it? 01:08:35.600 --> 01:08:39.439 Circles back to uh Oh yeah, oh, oh, oh, oh um nature versus nurture. 01:08:39.920 --> 01:08:40.640 Nature versus nurture. 01:08:40.960 --> 01:08:41.920 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 01:08:42.079 --> 01:08:44.159 It's uh it's a very interesting thing. 01:08:44.319 --> 01:08:49.359 And so yeah, we'll have I mean who knows what we'll learn more about Marcus's family too. 01:08:49.439 --> 01:08:53.199 Um but at the very least, the trauma, I mean, he had the trauma's there. 01:08:53.359 --> 01:08:54.319 The trauma's there. 01:08:54.880 --> 01:08:56.560 A lot of different types of nuts. 01:08:56.800 --> 01:08:59.840 But anyway, this is Deadly Class Issues 1 through 3. 01:09:00.000 --> 01:09:00.640 Very, very soon. 01:09:00.720 --> 01:09:05.439 Uh maybe it'll even be next one, but very, very soon we'll definitely be doing four through six, um, or maybe even more. 01:09:05.520 --> 01:09:06.479 So be there for that. 01:09:06.720 --> 01:09:07.680 Go pick this one up. 01:09:07.760 --> 01:09:09.359 As I always say, go pick this one up. 01:09:09.520 --> 01:09:12.640 Go take a look at the art, or at the very least, look at it on Instagram. 01:09:12.720 --> 01:09:17.039 Um and whoever of you guys are still listening at this point, you are just real ones. 01:09:17.279 --> 01:09:18.159 You are real ones. 01:09:18.239 --> 01:09:19.279 I just want to let you know. 01:09:19.439 --> 01:09:20.239 Yeah, real. 01:09:20.640 --> 01:09:22.079 So we appreciate you. 01:09:22.720 --> 01:09:25.199 Um, but yeah, thanks for listening, guys. 01:09:25.359 --> 01:09:29.279 Uh give us that we we really shouldn't be saying this at the end when no one's still here. 01:09:29.439 --> 01:09:36.000 I know, but but review that shit, follow on that shit, share the shit with other people. 01:09:36.399 --> 01:09:37.119 All the good stuff. 01:09:37.279 --> 01:09:39.039 Um hit that like and subscribe. 01:09:39.279 --> 01:09:42.079 Hit that like and subscribe, hit that thumbs up, you know how it goes. 01:09:42.319 --> 01:09:42.640 Hit the bell. 01:09:45.119 --> 01:09:50.079 Yep, and uh and we'll we'll come back soon and read some more Deadly Class and get into some more cool stories. 01:09:50.319 --> 01:09:51.119 Peace, everybody. 01:09:51.279 --> 01:09:51.920 Thanks.

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