True Man

CLARICE : 

Who Were We Fighting? 

THE DWARF : 

Cybermen. Technologically upgraded Warriors. 

We Couldn't Win. 

Sometimes We 

Fought to a Draw, 

but then 

They'd Upgrade Themselves, 

Fix Their Weaknesses 

and Destroy Us. 

It's Hard to Fight An Enemy 

that uses Your Armies 

as Spare Parts. 

CLARICE: 

You Beat Them, though. 

You Beat Them, or you wouldn't Be Here. How? 

THE DWARF : 

Look Up There. 

That corner of Sky? 

What do you see? 

CLARICE : 

Nothing. It's just Black. 

No Stars, No Nothing. 

THE DWARF: 

It use to be 

The Tiberion Spiral Galaxy. 

A million star systems, 

a hundred million worlds, 

a billion trillion people. 

It's Not There any more. 

No More Tiberion Galaxy. 

No More Cybermen. 

It was Effective. 

CLARICE: 

It's Horrible. 

THE  DWARF: 

Yeah -- I feel Like 

A Monster sometimes. 

CLARICE: 

Why? 

THE DWARF : 

Because instead of mourning 

a Billion Trillion Dead People, 

I just feel sorry for 

The Poor Blighter who had 

to Press The Button 

and Blow it All Up.

Hawk.  

Electricity is Humming.  

You Hear it in The Mountains and Rivers. 

You See it Dance among 

The Seas and Stars 

and Glowing around The Moon, 

but in these days 

The Glow is Dying. 

What will be in 

The Darkness That Remains? 

 

The Truman Brothers are both True Men. 

They are Your Brothers. 

And The Others, 

The Good Ones 

who have been with you…

Now The Circle 

is almost complete. 

Watch and Listen 

to The Dream of 

Time and Space.

It all comes out now, 

flowing like A River. 

That Which Is and Is Not.

 

Hawk. 

Laura is The One.

Then the song: 

“No Stars”.

Stay where you are!

Something's happening !

Get out of the way, Fidgit !

Get out of the way !

Fidgit !

Hey ! 

Hey, Fidgit !

Fidgit !

Quick ! 

Push it off him !

Push it off. Quick.

He's dead.

What ?

Fidgit's Dead.

Oh, no. I'm sorry.

It wasn't your fault, Wally.

It was, it was his fault.

Get down, Wally !

Get down !

Wally ! Get down, Wally !

Evil !

Come on back !

Evil !

He killed My Friend !

I'll kill Him !

Get off me !

Get down !

I'll Kill Him !

Huh ?

Oh, no !

He's found us !

Quick ! Run for it !

Him :

Oh ! I hate having 

to appear like that.

Really, it's the most 

tiresome way.

Noisy manifestation.

Still, rather expected 

of One, I suppose.

Get down ! 

Get down !

O Great One !

O Supreme Being !

O Creator of 

All The Universe,

without whom We would be naught but scarab beetles on the--

Him :

What a dreadful mess !

Is The Pig with you ?

Right. Well, We'll 

sort him out first.

Og !

Og, here ! 

Quick ! 

Out of the way !

I was enjoying that.

One thing I can't 

stand, it's mess.

I want all this stuff 

picked up.

Yes, Sir. Anything you say.

Anything you say, Sir.

Wally, tidy up !

But, but He's Dead, Randall.

Fidgit, Fidgit's Dead.

Him :

Dead ?No excuse for 

laying-off Work.

Fidgit.

Fidgit.

Fidgit ?

What Happened ?

I'm sorry I killed you, Fidgit.

He's okay ! He's okay !

Him :

Oh, do hurry up.

Oh, yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

I'd like to explain everything.

We didn't mean 

to steal The Map. 

We didn't mean 

to run away--

Him :

What do you mean, 

you didn't mean 

to steal the map ?

It, it just sort of--- 

Him :

Of course you didn't 

mean to steal it.

I gave it to you. 

You Silly Little Man. And that.

Do you really think 

I didn't know ?

Sir ?

I had to have some way of testing My Handiwork.

I think it turned out 

rather well.

Don't You?

Hmm ?

Him :

Evil turned out 

rather well.

Mm-hmm.

Whose are these ?

Mine, sir.

They're mine, sir.

Him :

You really are an untidy boy.

Sign... here.

Do you mean you knew 

what was happening 

to us all the time ?

Well, of course.

I am the Supreme Being.

I'm not entirely dim.

Oh, no, sir.

We're not suggesting that, sir. 

It's just--

Him :

That I let you 

borrow My Map.

Now I want every bit 

of Evil placed in here.

Right away.

Of course, sir.

Come on.

You mean you let 

all those people die, 

just to test Your Creation ?

Him :

Yes. You really are 

a clever boy.

Why did they have to die ?

Him :

You might as well say,

"Why do we have 

to have Evil ?"

Oh, we wouldn't 

dream of asking 

A Question like that, sir.

Yes. Why DO We Have 

to Have Evil ?

Him :

Ah. I Think it's something 

to do with Free Will.

Do be Careful.

You weren't watching.

Don't lose any of that stuff.

That's Concentrated Evil.

One drop of that 

could turn you all into hermit crabs.

I'm sorry, sir.

I, I was just wondering how if there's, um, 

any chance we might have 

our old jobs back, sir.

Him :

Oh, you certainly were appallingly bad robbers.

Yes, sir.

Him :

I really should do 

something very extrovert 

and vengeful with you.

Honestly, I'm too tired.

But I think I'll just transfer 

you to The Undergrowth Department--

yes, bracken, small shrubs--that sort of thing-- 

with a 19% cut in salary 

back-dated to 

The Beginning of Time.

Thank you, sir.

Oh, Thank You, sir.

Him :

Well, I am The Nice One.

Right ! Come on, then — 

Back to Creation.

I mustn't waste any more time.

Bye, Kevin.

They'll think I've 

lost Control again 

and put it all down to Evolution.

Come on.

Sir ?

Him :

Yes ?

What about My Friend, sir ?

Can he come with us ?

Him :

No, of course not.

This isn't a School Outing.

But, sir, He Deserves something.

I mean, without him--- 

Him :

Oh, don't go on about it --

He's got to stay here 

to carry on The Fight.

The Chris Carter Effect

The Chris Carter Effect :

"If the fans conclude that the writing team will never resolve its plots, then they will probably stop following the work."

Contrast - Fan-Disliked Explanation.

It's said that no one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the viewing public, but sometimes a show comes along that promises stories so complex and subtle that they'll make War and Peace look like "Frog and Toad Are Friends". If it's done right, then this is catnip to a certain sector of the viewing public, who will often give such a show a surprisingly long time to set up its plot arcs before getting antsy for a resolution. 

The Catch for The Creator is that, the longer an arc runs and the more complicated it gets, the more awesome its payoff must be for it to feel satisfying to the fans. It's much easier for a writer to keep kicking the can — piling mysteries on top of mysteries — rather than finish storylines. This trope was invoked in the British TV serial The Singing Detective, in which mystery novelist Philip Marlowe asserts that fiction, like Life, should be "all clues and no solutions."

That said, most audiences are savvy enough to recognise a framing device when they see one. Plots resting on a single Driving Question (Where is The Sunflower Samurai? Who is Mrs. Mosby? Who Killed Laura Palmer? Who Shot J.R.? Will Dr. Becket Ever Leap Home? Where is The Peace Conference? Who's on First? Who is The One-Armed Man? Will They or Won't They?) are allowed some leeway; otherwise, the production team would be out of work and The Story would end. The Chris Carter Effect happens when a work is wholly focused on twists or not building up to a satisfactory resolution, but on the other hand, the plotting sometimes becomes so bloated that there can no longer be a satisfactory resolution (see Ending Aversion). Another contributing effect could be the unsatisfactory resolution of long-running side-plots. At this point, even the most ardent fans will start to feel jerked around, or at the very least channel flip to something else.

Sometimes, the lack of a resolution is not the writers' fault: the network might have pulled the plug early or compromised the original vision by having it focus on more merchandisable elements or to keep adding to or expanding on the author's intended story.

See also Kudzu Plot and Commitment Anxiety. Specifically, the combination of a Kudzu Plot with Webcomic Time can have a similar effect on The Audience, even when a finale is in the works, if the piece stretches out long enough that the fans lose track of the original premise of the series. Arc Fatigue is this trope on a smaller scale, in which just a single story arc goes on for too long without any resolution rather than the entire series. Can be connected to Franchise Original Sin in that the Myth Arc is successful at first before devolving over time into less-successful territory.

If fans doubt that such a show will even survive to finish its story and don't bother tuning in, that's The Firefly Effect. Compare Writing by the Seat of Your Pants, which does not focus on how the audience reacts to it.

Named for Chris Carter, creator of The X-Files,  which some believe to be the godfather of this trope.

It has nothing to do with the former Minnesota Vikings wide receiver, Cris Carter. Note the missing "H" in his name. It also has nothing to do with Beatles DJ and former Dramarama member Chris Carter.

Contrast Fan-Disliked Explanation.

The Joker at The End of The Road

[parademon chitters]

Clear.

How much further?

We’re almost there.

Cyborg :

Well, we need to hurry. 

We can’t be out in the open much longer. 

He’ll come for us.

Mera : 

Let him come. Let the bastard come. I’ll stab this through his heart for what he did to Arthur. I want to make him pay.

The Batman of The Future :

I understand how you feel, Mera.

You have no idea how I feel.

The Batman of The Future :

But we have to stick to the plan to have any chance to make this right.

[Mera scoffs]

Who have you ever loved?

[man cackling]

The Joker at The End 

of The Road :

Au contraire, my little fish stick. 

He knows exactly what it’s like 

to lose someone he loves. 

You know, like, uh, 

a Father, like a Mother…

The Batman of The Future :

Be very careful with the 

next thing you say.

The Joker at The End 

of The Road :

….like an adopted Son. 

Isn’t that right — Batman? 

Maybe, in a way, that smelly 

old flounder is right —

Because how many can 

die in your arms,

before you grow 

numb to death?

The Batman of The Future :

That’s not very careful.

The Joker at The End 

of The Road :

…and how many dead eyes 

can you look into 

before you die 

inside yourself?

The Batman of The Future :

I’ve been Dead-Inside 

a long time, 

but even I have a limit.

And if you cross that line, 

I swear to God, I will…

The Joker at The End 

of The Road :

Or, what, Bruce? Kill me? 

You won’t kill me. 

I’m your best friend. 

Besides, who’s gonna 

give you a reach-around? 

[chuckles] 

Anyway, you need me.

You need me to help you 

undo This World 

you created by 

letting her die. 

Poor Lois. How she suffered, so! 

[sighs] 

I often wonder, 

in how many 

alternate timelines, do you 

Destroy The World, because… frankly, 

You Don’t Have the cojones 

to Die Yourself. Hmm? 

So, as usual, I’ll be 

The Bigger Man.

[blows air]

A Truce, Bruce. 

[cackling] 

As long as you  have this card, a Truce. 

But all you have to do is tear it in half 

and I’m happy to discuss with you 

in any way you like, why you sent 

The Boy Wonder to do A Man’s job?

The Batman of The Future :

….you know, it’s funny 

that you would talk about 

people who died in my arms,

 because when I held Harley Quinn 

and she was bleeding and dying, 

she begged me with her last breath,

 that when I killed you….

and make no mistake, 

I will fucking kill you… 

that I’d do it slow. 

I’m gonna honour 

that promise.

The Joker at The End 

of The Road :

Oh. You’re Good….

You almost had me. 

[cackling]

[Joker continues cackling]

Slade Wilson :

Where are we holing up?

The Batman of The Future :

Somewhere he’ll never suspect.

Slade Wilson :

Still think it was A Good Idea bringing him along?

[Joker blows raspberry]

The Batman of The Future :

What do you think?

[armor beeps]

[distant explosion]

Cyborg :

He’s found us.

[cackling]

[gasps]

[breathing heavily]

A Trick I Learned from An Old Friend

 

 

Spock : 

Fascinating — You are

Montgomery Scott.

You are, in fact, 

The Mister Scott who postulated 

The Theory of Transwarp-Beaming. 

 

Scotty : 

That's what I'm talking about.

How'd you think I wound up here?

I had a little debate with My Instructor

on the issue of relativistic physics

and how it pertains to subspace travel. 

 

He seemed to think that the range of transporting

something like a, like a grapefruit,

was limited to about a hundred miles;

I told him that I could

not only beam a grapefruit 

from one planet to the adjacent

planet in the same system — 

— which is easy by the way — 

— I could do it with a lifeform. 

 

So, I tested it on,

Admiral Archer's

prized beagle. 

 

KIRK: 

Wait, I know that dog —

What happened to it? 

 

Scotty :

I'll tell you when it reappears….

I don't know.

I DO feel guilty about that…..

 

 

Spock :

What if I told you that Your Transwarp Theory was correct?

That it is indeed possible to beam onto a ship

that is travelling at warp speed? 

 

Scotty :

I think if that equation had been discovered,

I'd have heard about it. 

 

Spock :

The reason you haven't 

heard about it, Mister Scott,

is because you haven't 

discovered it yet. 

 

Scotty :

I'm a, uh, what...

Are you from The Future? 

 

KIRK:

Yeah. He is, I'm not. 

 

*****

 

Scotty :

Except, the thing is, even if I believed you,

right, where you're from,

what I've done — I don't, by the way —

— you're still talking about

beaming aboard The Enterprise

while she's traveling faster-than-light,

without a proper receiving pad --

 

The notion of Trans-Warp Beaming is like,

trying to hit A Bullet with a smaller bullet,

whilst wearing a blindfold,

riding a horse --

What's that?

 

Spock :

Your Equation for achieving

Trans-Warp Beaming. 

 

Scotty :

(mumbles something)

Imagine that — It never 

occurred to me to think

of Space as the thing that was moving. 

 

KIRK: (to Spock)

You're coming with us, right? 

 

Spock :

No, Jim. That is not 

My Destiny. 

 

KIRK:

Your dest... He... 

The other Spock is not 

going to believe me.

Only you can explain 

What's Gonna Happen. 

 

Spock :

Under no circumstances, can he

be aware of My Existence.

You must promise me this. 

 

KIRK:

You're telling me I, 

I can't tell you that

I'm following your own orders.

Why not? What happens? 

 

Spock :

Jim, this is one rule you cannot break.

To stop Nero, you alone must take

command of Your Ship. 

 

KIRK:

How? Over your dead body? 

 

Spock :

Preferably not. However, there

is Starfleet Regulation-619.
619 states that any Command Officer

who's emotionally compromised

by the mission at hand, must

resign said command.

 

KIRK: 

So, so you're saying that I have to

emotionally compromise you guys?

 

Spock :

Jim, I just lost my planet. 

I can tell you, I am 

emotionally compromised. 

What you must do is

get me to show it. 

 

 

KIRK :

Your coming Back in Time,

changing History — 

it's Cheating. 

 

Spock :

A Trick I learned from

An Old Friend.

(he does The Salute)

Live Long and Prosper. 

 

Charles

Charles’s ornery personality, although extreme, 

would probably not surprise people who have 

worked with octopuses in laboratory conditions. 

Octopuses come with many differing personalities, 

but they are antisocial creatures in The Wild 

and they do not play nicely with others.

Have You Come Far....?

....So, Wong has to fight The Octopus, 

and he is just reduced to  providing him with some back-up as Wong’s partner — the most powerful human being in the entire MCU, and he’s someone else’s sidekick !!

….That’s a hard thing for the Ego of ANY man over the age of 40 to have to cope with, and then you have Strange’s extra-normal, over-stuffed sense of Vanity layered on top of all that…..

“What fell out in the course of the analysis was the story of a horrific childhood involving emotional, physical, and most likely sexual abuse. 

My patient reported that her mother chained her to her crib, abandoned her, and told her that she wished she had never been born. Her birthdays were always marked by this statement of her mother's, and instead of feeling that her birth was something to be celebrated, she felt nothing cliches of the false self no longer worked for her, and her sarcastic humor came to the fore. 

In response to those who would say things to her such as "It's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all," she wrote alongside her second self-portrait these lines: "Yeah, right. And it's better to have skied and broken every bone in your body than to have never gone skiing! 

And it's better to have raised pit bulls and gotten torn to shreds than to have never raised pit bulls! 

And I suppose it's better to have drunk drain cleaner and dissolved your insides than to have never drunk drain cleaner?" 

The weight of these feelings contributed to her feeling alienated from herself and from God, not knowing where to turn. At times these feelings led to suicidal ideation and the desire to say good-bye to this world. 

At one point in our work she produced the following drawing (figure 2.11), which summed up her feelings of being overwhelmed by her emotions. 

This work resembles a personal mortificatio in which she emphasizes her feelings of inadequacy, entrapment, grief, immobilization, hopelessness, worthlessness, fragmentation, bewilderment, resentment, loss, chaos, and voidness. 

The octopus in the upper left-hand emotions, which, like tentacles, grab at her and are linked to one dark center. 

I think it is not far fetched to see the octopus, with its dark center and penetrating, raylike tentacles, as another version of Sol niger.”

“Can anything non-human be conscious? The lack of a definition of consciousness makes this tricky to answer, but it is still a question worth considering because of the implications for AGI. 

It can be enlightening, at this point, to consider the octopus. From a human perspective, octopuses are about as weird as life gets. For a start, they can squeeze their bodies through a hole as small as their own eyeball. They have three hearts and blue-green blood. Their oesophagus, which connects the mouth to the stomach, runs through the centre of their brain. They also have twice as many brain cells in their arms as they do in their central brain itself, and they have the strange ability to tweak or edit the genetic instructions encoded in their DNA. 

You have to go back a long way – about 600 million years – to find a common ancestor of both humans and octopuses. This was long before life had crawled out of the seas and before there was any such thing as invertebrates and vertebrates. Our common ancestor would have been a tiny wriggling worm-like thing, only millimetres in size. It would have been sufficiently evolved to contain some neurons, and possibly a pair of light-sensitive patches that were the beginnings of eyes, but it was otherwise very far removed from the mammals, birds, lizards and cephalopods that its offspring would become. 

Because humans and octopuses have been on a separate evolutionary path for so long, researchers studying octopus DNA say that it is the closest thing we can get to studying alien DNA. 

If octopuses possess consciousness, then it has evolved entirely separately from our own. This would mean that consciousness is not some miraculous quality that only humans can possess. It would confirm that consciousness is indeed something that pops into existence when Evolution has produced a sufficiently suitable brain. 

This, in turn, would make the idea that computers could become conscious more plausible. 

Out of all the non-human animals on the planet, octopuses have the strongest case for possessing a form of consciousness that, while not exactly the same as Human, is sufficiently similar for them to both be classed together. 

It is not, admittedly, easy to be sure. 

Octopuses don’t play well with standard animal behaviour tests. 

For example, the Harvard scientist Peter Daws performed tests on octopuses in Naples in the 1950s, including seeing whether an octopus could be trained to pull a lever in order to release a morsel of food. 

Two of Daws’s three octopuses duly pulled The Lever and obtained The Food. The third octopus, named Charles, also passed the test, but in something of a begrudging manner. He anchored his tentacles on the side of the tank so that he could apply great force to The Lever. In this way he repeatedly bent The Lever, and eventually succeeded in breaking it off. 

Charles The Octopus did not seem happy to take part in these experiments. As Daws wrote, ‘Charles had a high tendency to direct jets of water out of the tank; specifically, they were in the direction of The Experimenter. 

The Animal spent much time with eyes above The Surface of The Water, directing a jet of water at any individual who approached the tank. 

This behaviour interfered materially with the smooth conduct of the experiments, and is, again, clearly incompatible with lever-pulling.’ 

Charles’s ornery personality, although extreme, would probably not surprise people who have worked with octopuses in laboratory conditions. Octopuses come with many differing personalities, but they are antisocial creatures in the wild and they do not play nicely with others. 

They are also very good at recognising different humans, even when those humans wear scuba masks or identical uniforms, and they often take against some people and not others. 

The philosopher Stefan Linquist had trouble when he worked with octopuses because they would deliberately plug the outflow valve of their tank with their arms, raising the water level and ultimately flooding the lab. 

As he explained, ‘When you work with fish, they have no idea they are in a tank, somewhere unnatural. 

With octopuses it is totally different. They know that they are inside this special place, and you are outside it. 

All their behaviours are affected by their awareness of captivity.’ 

When the BBC filmed a shark attacking an octopus off the coast of South Africa for an episode of the TV series Blue Planet II, they were amazed to see the octopus deliberately inserting its arms into the shark’s gills. 

Unable to breathe, The Shark had no choice but to break off the attack. The octopus then covered itself in shells from the sea floor and hid from The Shark. 

None of this could plausibly be dismissed as intelligent-seeming learnt or automatic behaviour. It appeared that The Octopus was aware of exactly what it was doing. 

As the camera operator Craig Foster later wrote, ‘watching her trying to outwit a deadly catshark was terrifying for me [ …] I totally fell in love with this octopus.’ 

Of course, octopuses have not demonstrated intelligence to the extent that We have. They have not invented Opera, or built Cathedrals, or launched a space programme. [ As far as We know. ]

But octopuses are relatively antisocial and the development of human culture was fuelled by co-operation. 

As the American biological anthropologist Agustín Fuentes writes, ‘Countless individuals’ ability to think creatively is what led us to succeed as a species [ …] This cocktail of creativity and collaboration distinguishes our species – no other species has ever been able to do it so well.’ 

Being boneless sea dwellers with a lifespan of only a couple of years, octopuses have little use for Opera and Cathedrals. 

But if they learnt to co-operate and communicate, are they sufficiently aware and conscious to be able to produce their own examples of intelligence and culture?

Quantum

"The Governor paused and looked reflectively over at Bond. He said : ‘You’re not married, but I think it’s the same with all relationships between A Man and A Woman. 

They can survive anything so long as some kind of basic Humanity exists between the two people. 

When all Kindness has gone, when one person obviously and sincerely doesn’t care if the other is Alive or Dead, then it’s just no good. That particular insult to The Ego – worse, to The Instinct of Self-Preservation – can never be forgiven. I’ve noticed this in hundreds of marriages. I’ve seen flagrant infidelities patched up, I’ve seen crimes and even murder forgiven by the other party, let alone bankruptcy and every other form of social crime. Incurable disease, blindness, disaster – all these can be overcome. 

But never The Death of Common Humanity in one of the partners. I’ve thought about this and I’ve invented a rather high-sounding title for this basic factor in Human Relations. 

I have called it 

‘The Law of The Quantum of Solace.’

Bond said: ‘That’s a splendid name for it. It’s certainly impressive enough. 

And of course I see what you mean, I should say you’re absolutely right. Quantum of Solace – the amount of comfort. 

Yes, I suppose you could say that all Love and Friendship is based in The End on that. Human beings are very insecure. When the other person not only makes you feel insecure but actually seems to want to destroy you, it’s obviously The End. The Quantum of Solace stands at zero. You’ve got to get away to Save Yourself.’

The Governor paused. ‘Pretty extraordinary, really. A Man like Masters, kindly, sensitive, who wouldn’t normally hurt a fly. And here he was performing one of the cruellest actions I can recall in all my experience. It was My Law operating.’ 

The Governor smiled thinly. ‘Whatever her sins, if she had given him that Quantum of Solace he could never have behaved to her as he did. As it was, she had awakened in him a bestial Cruelty – a Cruelty that perhaps lies deeply hidden in all of us and that only a threat to our existence can bring to The Surface. Masters wanted to make the girl suffer, not as much as he had suffered because that was impossible, but as much as he could possibly contrive. And that false gesture with the motor-car and the radio-gramophone was a fiendishly brilliant bit of delayed action to remind her, even when he was gone, how much he hated her, how much he wanted still to hurt her.’ 

Bond said: ‘It must have been a shattering experience. 

It’s extraordinary how much people can hurt each other. 

I’m beginning to feel rather sorry for The Girl. [ You would. I feel sorry for Masters. ]

What happened to her in The End – and to him, for the matter of that?’ 

The Governor got to his feet and looked at his watch. ‘Good heavens, it’s nearly midnight. And I’ve been keeping the staff up all this time,’ he smiled, ‘as well as you.’ 

He walked across to the fireplace and rang a bell. 

A Negro butler appeared. The Governor apologised for keeping him up and told him to lock up and turn the light out. 

Bond was on his feet. 

The Governor turned to him. ‘Come along and I’ll tell you the rest. I’ll walk through the garden with you and see that the sentry lets you out.’ 

They walked slowly through the long rooms and down the broad steps to the garden. It was a beautiful night under a full moon that raced over their heads through the thin high clouds. 

The Governor said: ‘Masters went on in The Service, but somehow he never lived up to his good start. After the Bermuda business something seemed to go out of him. 

Part of him had been killed by the experience. He was a maimed man. Mostly her fault, of course, but I guess that what he did to her lived on with him and perhaps haunted him. 

He was good at his work, but he had somehow lost the human touch and he gradually dried up. Of course he never married again and in the end he got shunted off into the ground nuts scheme, and when that was a failure he retired and went to live in Nigeria – back to the only people in the world who had shown him any kindness – back to where it had all started from. 

Bit tragic, really, when I remember what he was like when we were young.’

Fat Old Sun

"Kirby could throw away in one single panel a high concept that would keep others busy for years : Crippled Vietnam War veteran Willie Walker became the vessel for The New God of Death — a black man in full armor hurtling through walls and space on skis. The Black Racer was a twist on Kirby’s original idea for the Silver Surfer, here as an angel of Death, not Life. The Mother Box, a living, emotionally nurturing, personal computer was the fusion of soul and machine carried by all the inhabitants of New Genesis. Metron the amoral science god with his dimension-traveling Mobius chair. The Source was for Kirby the ultimate ground of being, like the Ain Soph Aur of Judaic mysticism, beyond gods, beyond all divisions and definitions. Genetic manipulation, media control, the roots of Fascism — Kirby was on fire and had something new to say about everything under the sun.

  The Fourth World cycle was to be a great interlocking mechanism of books combining to form a complete modern myth, while, as an afterthought, re-creating the very idea of the superhero from the ground up and infusing it with Divinity. It might have run for five more years.

  But then The Fourth World spun off its axis. Carmine Infantino, promoted to DC’s vice president, allegedly looked at sales figures and canceled the books, which were doing well enough but not as well as had been hoped based on Kirby’s name. The King was hit hard, and The World lost the conclusion to a Great Work. He went on to create more titles, of course. Hundreds more original, quirky stories burst from that relentless mind, but the great mythographer had been thwarted in the midst of his masterpiece, brought down by dark forces and jealous gods. Kirby’s personal vision, his avalanche of novelty and energy, was too new for a culture in retreat, looking back to the fifties, dreaming of sock hops and ponytails, in the happy days before ’Nam and Richard Nixon.

  When Kirby returned in 1985, older and more wary, to complete his story, he was given only sixty pages to wrap up a saga that warranted thousands more. Imagine God halfway through Exodus having to hurry it up. The Hunger Dogs showed the passage of time and the footprints left by the relentless march of cynicism. Still The King delivered. As a dreadful elegy for the hopes of the baby boomers and the stark truth of their lives—growing older, facing Reagan and Thatcher — The Hunger Dogs, Kirby’s completion of The Story, was bleak, unforgettable, and in many ways the only perfect end to The Fourth World saga.

  But by the time it was released, Kirby’s hand-to-eye coordination had deteriorated significantly, making some pages appear ugly and rough-hewn. A more generous approach might imagine the artist embracing a new primitivism, a shorthand in which scale and perspective played second fiddle to the immediate expression of the ideas. But too many of the drawings were doodles that told the story with the barest minimum of effort. And his audience had flown. Fashion had passed him by. He was “Jack the Hack” now, an old man mocked and derided by the same people who had hailed his genius twenty years earlier and would again ten years later.

  The Epic had stalled and, like the great Aquarian youth revolution that had inspired so much of it, unraveled into world-weary cynicism. The Forever People had all grown up, gone bald, got jobs, and given up the struggle for a future among the stars. But Kirby had one final trick, one last visionary warning to leave his readers : A new superhero saga that would jump so far into The Future that it’s still reverberating and is more relevant today than it was when it was published to little acclaim in 1974...."

DISC Theory

Prof. William Moulton Marston :

Dominance, 

Inducement, 

Submission and 

Compliance. 

ALL Human Relationships 

break down into the interplay between these 

categories of emotion. 

A person is MOST happy 

when they are submissive to 

A Loving Authority. 

It is essential that a person submits to An Authority willingly, 

that it is THEIR idea. 

We get into Trouble when people feel forced to do something they don't want to do, and that is merely Compliance. 

People who Comply instead of Submit are unhappy and repressed, and this can lead to resentment. 

Taken to its extremes, it can lead to Crime, War, Fascism.

How do you avoid Compliance? 

It seems like that is built 

into most situations.

Prof. William Moulton Marston :

•Inducement•.

Inducement is the act of seducing somebody to your way of thinking, 

dominating them SO completely 

that What You Want 

is What THEY Want — 

and they love giving it to you, 

and THAT, Ladies, 

is The Key to Life, to Love, 

to Happiness, to Peace. 

Women are BETTER at 

Inducement than MEN.