Crossed Plus One Hundred 15

Crossed Plus One Hundred No.15 regular cover – art by Gabriel Andrade (this early version of the cover shows the incorrect artist, Rafa Ortiz, actual copy shows correct artist Martin Tunica)

Below are annotations for Crossed Plus One Hundred, No. 15 “A Scanner Darkly” (20 pages, cover date April 2016, released 10 May 2016)

Writer: Simon Spurrier, Artist: Martín Túnica, Series Outline: Alan Moore

>Go to CPOH annotations index
>Go to CPOH timeline
>Go to CPOH language/glossary
>Go to CPOH background, cast of characters

Note: some of this stuff is obvious. If there’s stuff I missed or got wrong, let me know in comments, or email linton.joe [at] gmail.com

WARNING: SPOILERS

General: Basic annotations up.

Cover 

• The captive figure on the right is Crossed villain Robbie Greer / Jokemercy.
• The central woman is protagonist Future Taylor.
• This scene seems like it is about to take place at the very end of this issue, but does not actually take place.

Page 1

panel 1

• Characters shown are Future Taylor (center) and Oneway MacBlarney (right, loading pistol).

panel 4

• This sets up a page-turn reveal.

Page 2

panel 1

• Each issue of CPOH is titled after a famous science fiction novel. “A Scanner Darkly” is a 1977 sci-fi novel by Philip K. Dick.
• This panel introduces Insa (with black hair and headband.)

Page 3

panel 4

• “Insanity is relative. …” (made clear on the next page) is a quote from sci-fi author Ray Bradbury.

Page 4

panel 1

• According to Wikiquote, Insa is slightly wrong on her Ray Bradbury quote attribution. The quote was originally from The Meadow (1947), originally a radio play, which was later revised into a short-story for the anthology The Golden Apples of the Sun (1953).

panel 2

• “Shore speechify weird” is somewhat counter-intuitive. This band of nomads speaks more like contemporary English than the 2108 Gapple or Alleghania speech.

Page 5

panel 4

• “Chrysler” apparently means “high quality” or “high grade”, a reference to the luxury car.

Page 6 – no specific annotations

Page 7

panel 2

• Taylor is de-coding more of the final Beau Salt journal transcripts she and Ufoq found in CPOH13 P11. Taylor explained the initial code in CPOH14 P10,p3: “Split the afterbet so’s “A” becomes “N”, “B” becomes “O”, and similarforth.” Subsequent chapters were in “a slightly less simplistic cipher” that Taylor has now solved.

panel 5

• “Bashful” is the name of the Crossed leader who is first mentioned in CPOH5, then appears in CPOH6, and is killed in CPOH12.

Page 8 – no specific annotations

Page 9

panel 2

• “Secateurs” is a British word for garden pruning clippers.
• “Sleepy” and “Sneezy” other of Beau Salt’s Crossed leaders, first mentioned in CPOH5.
• The circular mirror on the lower right is what Beau Salt is using to write/carve the journal entry. It is unclear why the image of the man’s face is not Beau Salt’s Crossed face.

Page 10-11 – no specific annotations

Page 12

panels 2-3

• “And so to bed” is a famous quote from Samuel Pepys diary; it echoes CPOH5 P15,p3.

Page 13

panel 2

• Mixed case captions are Taylor’s journals.

panel 4

• “Literating on compling back from the post mop” seems to refer to Salt’s “return” P12,p1 above.

Page 14

panel 1

• The woman with the mohawk is Cautious Optimism Kriswyczki.

Page 15

panels 1-2

• Kriswyczki is, of course, describing New York City now called “the Gapple Isles”. Gapple is short for The Big Apple.

Page 16

panel 1

• On the right is archivist Ufoq.

Page 17

panel 1

• “The ‘boro” is Murfreesboro, TN, Taylor’s home settlement since CPOH7.

Page 18

panel 1

• The face and voice are Bailey.

Page 19 – no specific annotations

Page 20

panel 2-3

• The voice and burned face describe Robbie Greer/Jokemercy, the Crossed infiltrator prominent in CPOH 1-6.

Page 21 – no specific annotations

Page 22

panel 3

• The wisp of blonde hair is an indication that this is not Greer. The Crossed’s face is shown in the next issue, though his name, Slaketime, is first mentioned in CPOH18 P4-5,p3.

 

THE END

>Go to Crossed Plus One Hundred No. 16 annotations
>Go to Crossed Plus One Hundred Annotation Index