[0536] Approaching Light Speed
└ posted on Thursday, 12 December 2013, by Novil
- Pollux: That’s the way to the V.I.R. area, by the way.
- Lily: V.I.R. area?
- Pollux: The meeting place for all raccoons that have ever been visited by Seeoahtlahmakaskay.
- Lily: I dunno, Woo. That sounds so… “elitist.”
- Pollux: You must love it to be the center of attention then, huh?
- Castor: Yeah… Pollux, we’d better make our exit before they’re spotted and we get almost crushed to death by the masses.
- Lily: !!!
- Woo: Could you, maybe, slow down a little?
- Lily: Raccoons accelerated to the speed of light are surprisingly hard to spot!
![[0536] Approaching Light Speed](/comics/2013-12-12-0536-approaching-light-speed.png "[0536] Approaching Light Speed")
Let’s just take a moment to appreciate Lily’s Face in the last panel….
I think I know who’s Sonic mother now.
Wait… I don’t get it. What’s going on?
Is she running towards the Very Important Raccoon area? Or away from the show altogether?
I really hope this is not the last we see of Castor and Pollux, they seemed really cool. Also, those who are unsure of what’s going on, there was a comic a while ago where Woo was visited by the raccoon goddess, who has an extremely long name which I’m not even going to try to spell because I will get it wrong. Anyway, because he and Lily were visited by her they are basically rock stars, and when attending an event such as this they are allocated a special area in which they can watch undisturbed. The VIR area, which I assume is an abbreviation for Very important Raccoon. Lily made her way to this area very quickly because she is agoraphobic (fear of crowded places) and did not wanted to be surrounded by adoring fans, though still wished to attend the event.
@ Sambo:
The second last frame makes it look rather like towards the VIR area.
@ Sambo:
I’m pretty sure she’s heading toward the ViR area, because those are the same silhouettes drawn when Pollux pointed it out to them.
But doesn’t their mass also increase towards infinity as they approach light speed? And their length in the direction of travel decrease toward zero? And time dilation make everything screwy?
Seeoahtlahmakaskay: No, no and no! The other gods thought I was off my head when I picked the special dispensations and abilities for my people… wait until they find out how I’m going to use the rest of them… heee!
Mark wrote:
Lily and Woo get shown the VIR (Very Important Raccoon) area, for every raccoon visited by Seeoahtlahmakaskay. Lily says it sounds “elitist”, but Castor and Pollux make jokes about how crowded it’s going to be. Lily doesn’t like crowds, so she runs at the speed of light to the VIR area.
Silly Lilly! It stands for Very Important Raccons, not Velocity Increasing Runners!
The fact that Woo can speak human would seem to be another reason that he should qualify as a VIR. Nobody seems to fully appreciate that. It is a pretty remarkable ability. I think we’ve established that humans are pretty important, even in this world.
@ Neospector:
I took it to be that racoons will be focused too much on her because of her visit. The VIR section isn’t elitist, it is a protection zone because they are like popes and if seen will cause a mini-riot of ‘coons trying to be awed. 🙂
lol love this one
What I want to know is that what the looks of Coon elites and what is their role in the coon society. Can you imagine the story change from splice of life into “Woo and the gang save the world from lurking danger?”
Well, at least they have not gone Plaid.
@ HardWearJunkie:
YEs it appears Lily managed to avoid hitting “Ludicrous Speed” I wonder if they will have any refreshments in the VIR section, perhaps a personal visit from “Pizza the Hut”?
Good Lord you could create a temporal reversal field with those speeds.
@ Xezlec:
Do we know that?
I was under the impression any of the other animals could speak (to a) “human” if they desired, but that this was, for some reason, a big secret.
@ Mark:
Lilly hates crowds 🙂 so basically being told that a mob of racoons might come their way if they’re spotted scared her like hell XD
“SINCE WHEN COULD YOU RUN SO FAST YOUR FEET TURN INTO TORNADOES!?”
“SINCE I MATED WITH SONIC THE HEDGEHOG-oh crap.”
*gasp* “You WHAT!? LILY!!”
“I’MSORRYI’MSORRYI’MSORRYI’MSORRY-”
“LILY COME ON REALLY!?”
“I’LL EXPLAIN LATER RIGHT NOW REALLY ISN’T THE TIME-”
“OF COURSE IT ISN’T! WE’RE YELLING SO LOUD IT’S A WONDER WE HAVEN’T BEEN SPOTTED YET DESPITE MOVING SO FAST!! HECK, WE’RE GOING FASTER THAN LIGHT, WHICH IS FASTER THAN SOUND, HOW CAN WE EVEN HEAR EACH OTHER!?”
“UUUUUUMMMMMMM…………………..GOOD QUESTION!”
“COMIC LOGIC YOU SCARE ME SOMETIMES!”
“WHAT!? WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO!? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!?”
“UH NOTHING!!”
@ Luke:
I think you mean claustrophobic, agoraphobia is the fear of large, open areas. Claustrophobia is the fear of small, enclosed, and/or crowded areas.
@ OctopusGardener:
Shit, nope, I was wrong. Carry on.
Crestlinger wrote:
That would require moving around rotating black hole couter its rotation
If I may make a suggestion: using periods, like “V.I.R.”, might help some people get the joke.
When I read it, I read it as a word (“vir”) and it took me a while to make the leap.
“V.I.P.” is a common way to write “VIP”. (Which now that I think about it is odd. Nobody bothers to write “L.A.S.E.R.” or “R.A.D.A.R.”! Maybe “VIP” just looks too much like a sound effect and people like the way the periods make it look more like an acronym?)
P.S. As always, thanks for making one of my favorite comics.
@ OctopusGardener:
I was under the impression that agoraphobic meant a fear of places that are crowded also, though I may have been wrong. 😀
@ Sean:
Yes, we do know. Lily has been shown to be unable to speak human even though she understands it because Woo has always had to translate for her.
@ Raven:
if that’s true, it’s the craziest crossbreeding I could ever imagine….
Maybe it’s just because I watched Face/Off recently, but with two raccoons called Castor and Pollux, I’m smelling a wee bit of a rat here…
@ Luke:
Agoraphobia is when someone feels anxiety in places they are unfamiliar with or feel they have little control over. It can include both wide open spaces and tightly crowded places. People with it often, but not always, fear having a panic attack and embarrassing themselves in front of people in these places and once they have had a panic attack somewhere, they can go to great lengths to avoid that location to prevent another one occurring.
Agoraphobia can develop as a symptom of PTSD, OCD or panic disorders when it includes panic attacks and with the small quantity that don’t have panic attacks, it is more likely to result from bullying or a traumatic experience.
Well, as far as i know due to Terrell rotation they would remain pretty much visible, only weirdly rotated.
Though Lily may not know about Terrell rotation…
Sonic the hedgehog wannabe ! T-T
Should have did the P meter and had lily fly away like the real Raccoons do! Or the old Tanuki suit that turns lily and woo to stone.
Super Sandra Bros 3
On an unrelated note, Mega Man #32 came out recently. With a variant cover by Powree.
@ Luke:
No, I was wrong. I was simply a case of looking it up after the fact. If I could have deleted my comment, I would have.
@ Luke:
you mean the name mentioned in the 2nd panel?
It’s my honest opinion that this comic is at its best when there are raccoons in it, Woo in particular.
Elitism, here we come!
Stop breaking physics! *sheds a tear*
Confusion solved:
In the penultimate (second to last) panel, Lily runs over to check out the VIR area.
Something she saw there terrified her.
and in the final panel she’s running away from it with Woo.
Light Speed fixed:
Einstein wasn’t a raccoon, so we can’t be sure the laws of physics we humans understand are the same as the ones for raccoons.
@ nitro:
Yes, that one that I never knew was there because I’m an idiot 😀
Wow. Forest animals know there’s such a thing as the speed of light. Hats off to them.
So is Sonic part racoon or something?
I just found this comic like 3 days ago from the Zoey & Michelle ad on the Super Redundant webcomic, and I just finished catching up. It all went by so fast, haha! Anyway, this comic is awesome! <3
@ Mark:
Look at their face markings. That’s how you tell them apart (for ones that aren’t conveniently a different shade).
Antiyonder wrote:
Forget 32 I wanna Mega Man 11 Capcom ! Err wrong place to say that o well
Switch Master wrote:
Just saw the cover good job Powree. my anger was not for Powree it was for Capcom!
Ok, WHAT THE FFFFUUUAAAAAAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHHA?!?
At which point Lily gains relativistic mass and implodes on herself, becoming a black hole.
Jamie wrote:
The Catholic church, elitist? Surely you jest, sir!
@ HardWearJunkie:
Of course not the good guys only made the jump to light speed in Spaceballs. Only the bad guys were dumb enough to make the jump to Ludicrous Speed.