Smellhole notes
WHY. Because its there…
General? Shouldn’t he be an Admiral? Is this going to be explained?
Makes it sound like the rebellion has already won, and they just have to take this one last planet. Also if the Diadem has control over space travel, why do the rebels have ships.
How can this day “make or break the freedom fighters” when they have “a groundswell of popular support”
Bad writing editing: Its unclear whose “last stand” this is. That’s just the first paragraph.
If the General is calm and confident then why do his teeth ache from clenched jaws (nervous signifier)?
Driftwood in a flood, not intended to be a rebel leader.
What? These next few lines are daring him to turn into a monster and he’s going along with it as if its inevitable.And if the General let it come to that, he would be no better than Diadem Michella. But he didn’t see any way around it.
Generals don’t have flagships. Admirals have flagships. And they don’t command the bridge…
Wait for it…“His eyes…not having seen laughter in a long time.”
His fleet is superior to what the "Army of the Constellation" could muster on short notice to defend the capital…
MALE TYPE I Franck Tello is ‘cheery’ as usual. Likes profanity. Comic relief to break the ice. Codeword “panties” makes fanboys cream.
I guess laugh-tracks don’t count.“His eyes…not having seen laughter in a long time.”
The men on the bridge chuckled.
“His eyes…not having seen laughter in a long time.”
463 ships, spreading out to blockade the planet. Still haven’t spotted fleet on the other side.
Ooo last minute evacuation to cause chaos! At least these are smart enough to flee away from the fleet!
Hey one is fleeing towards the ships! Bumper car time! In space! Where Hull Integrity means jack squat! Good thing he didn’t use his ULTRAFAST engines so it was only a minor collision. In Space.
Seriously…
Ultrafast…
They are faster than fast! there is nothing faster than ultrafast! Please for the love of god, someone buy KJA an ultrathesaurus. That’s a book Kev, not a Dinosaur.
Michella’s ships fire indiscriminately on civilians and we’re hammered again with how much TA doesn’t want to kill anyone unless he has too. We'll find later he won't kill anyone even to save the lives of his men or win the rebellion.
Weapons Lt: Lets blow up the transport hub you just sent people in to capture!
General TA: No, that makes me look bad. I can’t look bad.
Frigate: We captured it! Ain’t it grand how problems solve themselves!
W Lt: Oh look, ships hiding in the sensor shadow of the planet. Man, we fall for that one every time. You’d think they would train us better, wait I’m a rebel. I was probably just some dumb farmer kid that never had to think in combat scenarios.
Enemy forces move in a
So wtf was the point of the ‘random flurry’ statement other than word count?random flurry as if to disguise their numbers. “Three hundred and twelve, sir. And that’s an accurate count. Probably all the ships she’s got left.”
Muttonchops? Seriously is this the Confederacy?
Ooo this guy has actually won battles and only lost narrowly. And he has an actual Navy title: Commodore! But wait, aren’t these guys in ships from the Army of the Confed…er Constellations? (sigh)
This next part I was just yelling HIT RECORD, RECORD THE IMAGES. SOMEONE RECORD THIS, IT MIGHT BE IMPORTANT!“History rests on the details…I demand your surrender.” (laughtrack)
To be fair, since we have no idea what this rebellion is even about, we can't make a judgment call.
No, wait, we can. TA wants to keep civilian deaths to a minimum. That's good. Well of course, because he's the good guy. But this General is so Paladin uptight that he lets his own men die and doesn't even order weapons fire to disable the ships rather than destroy them. He has twice as many ships. HE DOESN'T EVEN RETREAT. He just sits there.
This guy is a General? What was he defending, Candyland?
Quick Scene Change so the 'writers' don't have to deal with important questions!
Why don’t they just outright clone Louis XVI instead of having the Diadem Duchenet. I have to call her that so I don’t call her Murbella.
She’s such a brutal corrupt “angry death-angel” leader that she responds by showing mercy on her worst enemy. What are her crimes? Being Corrupt? She's evil right? Is that it?
WOMAN TYPE I: Psycho evil Bitch. In a nice way.
Again. W T FThe crowd let out an angry mutter, though not nearly as loud as Michella had hoped. Somehow, the man had sparked a popular fervor across the Crown Jewels. Why, they actually viewed him as heroic!
Ooh, Lord Riomini wear black. I bet he’s evil. He even named his planet after the Chaos God from Elric. Misspelled it though… Wait, he rules that planet? Is he not part of the Constellation? His name starts with S so he's obviously a bad guy.
MALE TYPE II S-named black evil guy.
Now Murbell…dammit Duchenet wants to kill him, and the other evil guy says to keep him alive.
"Hey lets form some ‘committees’ and the groundswell of rebellion that built a movement so powerful they almost took the capital planet will disappear! I’m sure that will make them forget we only won by packing them into our ships so the rebels wouldn’t fire on us."
TA denied NONE of the charges because he thinks he’ll be found guilty anyway? From the same guy who let the rebellion fail because he wouldn’t fire on ships that were killing his own men because history would remember him as a monster.
He’s granted exile with as many of his followers as would like to go…
OOOO fanboy alert!
But wait….”Better to rule in Hell than Serve in Heaven” Spoken by Lucifer. So….Adophus is Lucifer, king of hell. And he’s named Adolph… And he’s rebelling against a brutal Death Angel…so even God in this equation is evil. I think I’ve figured it out. Hellhole isn’t the planet, it’s the whole fucking universe.“Better to rule on the most hellish frontier planet than to serve the corrupt government on Sonjeera.”
WHAT?“Michella had to hide a satisfied smile. Even his followers would admit that she was benevolent. They could not fault her.”
XXX
Smokestorm Codeword: Sandstorm, but with smoke
Green smoke?
That leaves grit all over everything.
But the breezes would blow it away
Or maybe it won’t. Weather is finicky. DUDE I LIVE IN FUCKIN TEXAS. WEATHER IS FINICKY YES, EVERYWHERE.
THEY NAME THE TOWN AFTER MICHELLA? IS THE GREEN SMOKE LSD?
Why is his driver a LT. Seems like a shit job for a LT. Is he the aide-de-camp? No, it says its his driver.
Adolphus had
shown the colony how to survive whatever the world had tosinglehandedly
throw at them.
Well then lets hope the old coot doesn’t die. Kinda interesting how ‘the great General’ has all these military personnel but apparently he’s the ONLY one with survival training.
Oh he named the town to get back at Douchenet. Yeah, great insult. Well, maybe he did it so it would be a constant reminder to those who are there who fucked up. Mixed with the random assortment of useless cargo they get this is beginning to sound like a bad marriage. I will not be surprised when its later revealed that these two were an item at one point.
Wait...
Ice-parkas and underwater breathing apparatus being useless means no ice and no liquid water on the planet. Fuck it from now on I’m calling this Dune. And I will not be surprised when they reveal that the Hellhole trilogy is the origin story for the Muadru.
At all.
Woman type II Flirty love interest. Subtype MILF
Hey great way to use Intelligence. “they don’t know that I know, so I’ll show up so he knows that I know. I’ll even wear my fucking uniform so I can’t say ‘fancy meeting you here’"
Alkaline dust. Yeah that sounds conducive to public health.
Sending convicts to a harsh world to rehabilitate them. Yep, its Dune.
I love how non combat ships are basically just inside-out Heighliners. I’m sorry, I mean Stringliners. With ULTRAFAST engines…
They even have to send tribute in the form of ‘upboxes’.
Do you mean taxes? Is this whole thing one big Tea Party revolt? Seriously, are we going to get specific reasons for the revolt or just “I don’t like the gubment, day evil?”
[Continued on Page 5!]