Spoilers for Die #18
Jul. 16th, 2021 02:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexxkay...and, I suspect, #19.
I just read Die #18. It reveals another chunk of backstory, and some very significant ways in which our narrator has been unreliable. And there are just two issues left.
I figured this was a good time to go back and re-read the story so far. Gillen is almost always a highly structured sort of writer, so by this point the content of the next two issues ought, at least to some extent, to be foreseeable. And even if I get it wrong, it's a fun game to play.
I haven't got very far in the re-read yet. But there's a story element that is casually tossed-off in issue #1 that I am convinced we'll be coming back to in #19. On the third page, Sol says: "This [Die] is something I've made for Ash to celebrate his sixteenth." And just two pages later, Ash narrates: "I loved it. I loved that he made it for me. Part of me still does."
You know what phrase does not appear anywhere in issue #1, despite being highly relevant to the plot? "Birthday present." Almost as if Gillen was carefully avoiding triggering any associations with a specific "Precious" birthday present. A "birthday present" which is mentioned over and over again in the single literary work with the most influence on (and intertexuality with) Die.
Oh, and the character from that book who keeps talking about "Precious"? They seem almost like they're split into two people. One of those selves is trying (with difficulty) to be a better person than they have been. The other one is a murderous traitor.
Methinks that what we saw on the last page of Die #18 is literally the part of Ash that still loves their birthday present and won't let it go without a fight.
Of course, I was also convinced that the Big Bad in Loki season 1 was going to be Loki, so what do I know?
I just read Die #18. It reveals another chunk of backstory, and some very significant ways in which our narrator has been unreliable. And there are just two issues left.
I figured this was a good time to go back and re-read the story so far. Gillen is almost always a highly structured sort of writer, so by this point the content of the next two issues ought, at least to some extent, to be foreseeable. And even if I get it wrong, it's a fun game to play.
I haven't got very far in the re-read yet. But there's a story element that is casually tossed-off in issue #1 that I am convinced we'll be coming back to in #19. On the third page, Sol says: "This [Die] is something I've made for Ash to celebrate his sixteenth." And just two pages later, Ash narrates: "I loved it. I loved that he made it for me. Part of me still does."
You know what phrase does not appear anywhere in issue #1, despite being highly relevant to the plot? "Birthday present." Almost as if Gillen was carefully avoiding triggering any associations with a specific "Precious" birthday present. A "birthday present" which is mentioned over and over again in the single literary work with the most influence on (and intertexuality with) Die.
Oh, and the character from that book who keeps talking about "Precious"? They seem almost like they're split into two people. One of those selves is trying (with difficulty) to be a better person than they have been. The other one is a murderous traitor.
Methinks that what we saw on the last page of Die #18 is literally the part of Ash that still loves their birthday present and won't let it go without a fight.
Of course, I was also convinced that the Big Bad in Loki season 1 was going to be Loki, so what do I know?