Flying through the Astral Plane, Thor explains the nature of the Astral and Outer Planes to Durkon and Minrah.
Cast
- Durkon Thundershield (as spirit) ◀ ▶
- Minrah Shaleshoe (as spirit) ◀ ▶
- Thor ◀ ▶
Transcript
- Panel 1, Page 1
Minrah: Wooooooooo!
Durkon: *gulp*
- Panel 2, Page 1
Minrah: Yeah!
Thor: Ha ha, OK, that's enough fun for now. We need to get where we're going.
- Panel 3, Page 1
Durkon: Och, good. I dinnae know how I c'n feel so nauseous when I dinnae haf a stomach na more.
Thor: Oh, that's not the loop-de-loops doing that Durkon.
Thor: That's you reacting to the fabric of the Astral Plane, because you have too many thoughts.
- Panel 4, Page 1
Durkon: Too...many? How c'n ye haf too many?
Thor: You've got all of yours, and then all of the vampire's, too.
Thor: You mushed your minds up together real good down there, so now you're a bit too full.
- Panel 5, Page 1
Durkon: Tha's why I rememb'r everythin' 'e did like it were me, then?
Thor: Sure. You smash a melon with a rock, the rock's gonna get some pulp on it, you know?
Thor: You'll be fine.
- Panel 6, Page 1
Minrah: So, um, I have a question, if we're asking questions. What exactly is this place?
Durkon: Ye mean the Astral Plane?
Minrah: Yeah.
- Panel 7, Page 1
Minrah: I know I should know, but I took the abbreviated night course for the priesthood, to work around my schedule as a guard.
Minrah: We glossed over a lot of the metaphysical stuff to focus on turning and smiting.
- Panel 8, Page 1
Thor: It's not a problem, Minrah.
Thor: The easiest way to understand it is that the Outer Planes are where all the gods and outsiders and afterlives are—
Thor: —and the Astral Plane is all the stuff in-between.
- Panel 9, Page 1
Thor: If the Outer Planes are the panels of a comic strip, the Astral Plane is all the gutters.
Minrah: Oh, sorry, I don't really read comics.
Thor: Eh, you're not missing much.
- Panel 1, Page 2
Thor: The important point is, it's an endless expanse of weightless nothing that people mostly use only to get from one plane to another.
Thor: No one lives here except for a few trademarked creatures that know better than to bother us.
- Panel 2, Page 2
Minrah: OK, but...what is it? What am I looking at?
Minrha: It's so pretty and silver, but you said it was affecting Durkon's mind?
- Panel 3, Page 2
Thor: Oh, well, it's made of thoughts.
Thor: Everything out here is made of ideas, when you get right down to it. Even me!
- Panel 4, Page 2
They fly through a ring of circles each surrounded by a phrase:
"Truth, Justice, and the Celestial Way."
"Let's all do our part."
"Everyone should care."
"Who's a good dog? You are!"
"Words aren't as important as people."
"Fight the good fight."
"Don't you tell me what to do."
"Hey, let's not get carried away."
"Lulz."
"Screw you, jack, I got mine."
"You're bad and you should feel bad."
"Nothing matters."
"Resistance is futile."
"Yes, but if you read the fine print..."
"I was just following orders."
"There's only one right path."
"The needs of the many..."
Thor: The Outer Planes are ideas that were so powerful, for better or for worse, that they became places.
Thor: The spirits of people who believe those things strongly are drawn to them, and help make the plane itself.
- Panel 5, Page 2
They fly through some thoughts not associated with planes. "I need to pick up milk." "Ugh, that looks infected." "Oh god...I'm gonna—I'm gonna—" "The infield fly rule." "Does this soup need more carrots?"
Thor: And the Astral is made of all the other thoughts. The ones that matter, but don't MATTER.
- Panel 6, Page 2
They fly through still more thoughts. '"Further" or "farther"' "That's a great idea for a novel!" "My wedding anniversary is tomorrow." "Sha Na Na." "I definitely turned the oven off."
Thor: But for our purposes, it's just a great place to stash stuff you don't want anyone else to find.
Thor: Especially this far out, among the thoughts that no one even remembers.
- Panel 7, Page 2
Minrah: Thank you for explaining, Lord Thor! I found that very...uh...what's the word?
Thor: Keep looking, I'm sure it's around here somewhere.
D&D Context
- In panel 1 on page 2, Thor mentions "a few trademarked creatures" native to the Astral Plane. This refers to "Product Identity" creatures trademarked by D&D owner Wizards of the Coast which are not in the open System Reference Document.
- Principal among these inhabitants of the Astral Plane are the Githyanki. Githyanki are a race of psychic-powered humanoids in D&D. They were created by Charles Stross and first published in 1979 in an article in White Dwarf #12, published by Games Workshop as part of the "Fiend Factory" series. These articles were later expanded on and published as part of AD&D in the 1981 Fiend Folio. The name and some aspects of the creature were borrowed from the 1977 science fiction novel Dying of the Light by George R. R. Martin.
- Another creature native to the Astral Plane is the Berbalang, which was likewise part of the "Fiend Factory" series, published in White Dwarf #11. It has a physical body, but spends most of its life in hibernation while its spirit travels the Astral Plane.
- Panel 4 on page 2 depicts the Outer Planes of D&D's cosomology. The colored circles (and one square) represent the seventeen Outer Planes, and are presented in a ring, as they have been since their inception in a 1977 article in Dragon #8, with the exception of the beige circle nearest to Thor, which represents the Outlands, a plane that was not part of Gygax's original conception. The planes are all associated with a particular alignment or as a transition between two alignments. The planes are, clockwise from the upper left:
Mount Celestia Lawful Good Bytopia Neutral Good / Lawful Good Elysium Neutral Good The Beastlands Neutral Good / Chaotic Good Arborea Chaotic Good Ysgard Chaotic Neutral / Chaotic Good Limbo Chaotic Neutral The Outlands True Neutral (beige circle inside the ring of other planes) Pandemonium Chaotic Evil / Chaotic Neutral The Abyss Chaotic Evil Carceri Neutral Evil / Chaotic Evil The Gray Waste Neutral Evil Gehenna Neutral Evil / Lawful Evil Baator Lawful Evil Acheron Lawful Neutral / Lawful Evil Mechanus Lawful Neutral Arcadia Lawful Neutral / Lawful Good
- Thor's comments on the basis and origin of the planes is not part of standard D&D cosmology, but is compatible with it and adds flavor to Rich Burlew's version of a D&D world.
- The Astral Plane appears to the reader as the mottled gray background throughout this strip, although Minrah's comment suggests the Astral Plane looks silver to the characters.
Trivia
- The title is a parody of the term "lesson plan".
- The gutters mentioned by Thor in the last panel of page 1 refer to the space, or in this case black lines, between the panels.
- The comic previously dealt with "Product Identity" monsters alluded to in panel 4, page 2, in #32, "Biting the Hand that Feeds Me".
- The representations of the Outer Planes make several references:
- "Truth, Justice, and the Celestial Way." (Mount Celestia) — a play on Superman's iconic phrase "Truth, Justice and the American Way", which originated in the 1940's The Adventures of Superman radio show, and was popularized in the 1950's Adventures of Superman TV show. After WWII, the phrase was "Truth, Justice, and Tolerance", but it was changed back to "the American Way" during the Cold War. In 2011, in Action Comics #900, Superman renounced his U.S. citizenship, saying "'Truth, justice and the American way'—it's not enough anymore".
- "Fight the Good Fight." (Ysgard) — an 1863 hymn by John Samuel Bewley Monsell, or the phrase from the King Jame Bible's translation of Paul's First Epistle to Timothy on which the song is based.
- "Lulz." (Pandemonium) — internet slang and an alteration of the initialism, "lol", short for "laughing out loud". "Lulz" has a particular connotation of Schadenfreude.
- "You're bad and you should feel bad." (Carceri) — a play on a memorable Dr. Zoidberg line from the 2003 Futurama episode, "The Devil's Hands Are Idle Playthings". The original line, "Your music is bad and you should feel bad," became an internet meme.
- "Resistance is futile." (Gehenna) — the often-repeated phrase of the Borg in the Star Trek universe. The phrase was first used in the Borg's second encounter with the Enterprise in the 1990 Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, "The Best of Both Worlds".
- "Yes, but if you read the fine print..." (Baator) — refers to the concept of a Faustian Bargain.
- "I was just following orders." (Acheron) — the defense of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremburg Trials and others who attempted to defend their involvement in the Holocaust.
- "The needs of the many..." (Arcadia) — the philosophy of the Vulcan philosopher Surak in the Star Trek universe, first expressed in the 1982 film, Star Trek II:The Wrath of Khan by Leonard Nimoy's character, Spock. The phrase continues, "... outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."
- Sha Na Na is an American rock band and 1970s variety TV show who took their name from the nonsense syllables in the 1957 song "Get a Job" by the Silhouettes. They preceded Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock, sparking a '50's nostalgia movement that included the Broadway musical Grease and the TV show Happy Days. "Sha Na Na" is also a catchphrase of TV personality Akbar Gbaja-Biamila on the TV series American Ninja Warrior.