The Naked and the Dead
| The Naked and the Dead | |
|---|---|
| |
| Comic Strip Info | |
| Released: | January 10th, 2017 |
| Number of pages: | 274 |
| Artist: | makani |
| Writer: | Jay Pinkerton & Erik Wolpaw |
| Colorist: | Maren Marmulla |
The Naked and the Dead (also known as Team Fortress Comics #6) is a comic released on January 10th, 2017. It is the penultimate issue of a seven-part comic series, picking up where Old Wounds left off.
Synopsis
The story begins with Miss Pauling lying face-down in the middle of a golden desert. Upon awakening, she spots a single unlocked door standing in the middle of nowhere; once she opens it, she is greeted by the Administrator, who sits in the middle of a control room lit green by multiple monitors, all of which show live footage of her face. She answers Miss Pauling's confused questions by explaining that this is the afterlife; they are both dead, and Miss Pauling has failed the Administrator's mission. Miss Pauling bluntly accept this fact, even informing her that all of the world's Australium was gone, but, given that she already failed the mission and was determined to understand the Administrator's motive behind the war after a decade of unyielding trust, asks the Administrator "what it is she wants". The Administrator simply replies with a grim "Blood. It's not enough. Give me more", with her voice echoing to Miss Pauling while she watches helplessly as the monitors begin to flicker with her own horrified expression.
The comic cuts immediately to the outside of the TFC base, where Old Wounds left off. The previous events were all simply a hallucination by Miss Pauling, who regains consciousness to find the Medic calling for Zhanna to "give him more blood" in order to save Miss Pauling and the Soldier. When asked how the Medic managed to save their lives when they were presumably dead from the TFC team's blood-draining robots, the Medic simply responds that he collected all of the blood drained by the robots and put it back into their bodies, while literally dumping a bucket of blood and debris into a smiling Soldier's open chest, much to Miss Pauling's disgust. When further questioned if he had even separated each of their blood types, the Medic quietly mentions that he used his own underwear to sponge up the blood, and that the blood type would be the least of their problems as of now.
As explanations go down, Miss Pauling catches a glimpse of the Demoman wildly taking on a bunch of robots all by himself; the Medic reasons that the high alcoholic content of the Demoman's blood must have given the robots alcohol poisoning, thus weakening them. However, Miss Pauling notes that the Demoman had not taken a single drop of alcohol since arriving on the island, making it impossible that he could be drunk. At this moment, the comic immediately cuts to a hallucination being experienced by the Demoman, in which he commands his heart to convert his various organs into distilleries after inventing a way to ferment his bone marrow. His liver even returns after leaving during the events of Old Wounds, and makes up with the Demoman by sharing a romantic kiss with him.
Meanwhile in the TFC base, a frustrated TFC Heavy is seen holding Gray Mann's Life-Extender machine and watching the events unfold on a large screen, loudly questioning how his team of trained mercenaries were being defeated by a bunch of "morons" and "lunatics". The TFC Engineer (named Fred) interrupts his thoughts, and asks how he and his coworkers would be paid if they already killed Gray Mann, their employer. The TFC Heavy bluntly responds that he should stop worrying about money when they had a life machine in their hands, but the TFC Engineer rebuttals by arguing that he can't make more life machines, especially since the device was "more biology than engineering". Without turning away from the monitor, the TFC Heavy asks what the TFC Engineer can do, with his response being that he could turn all of Gray Mann's old robots on again. Grabbing the TFC Engineer by the collar, the TFC Heavy demands that he does so immediately.
The scene cuts back to outside the base, with the Heavy and Scout parachuting from Saxton Hale's plane and reuniting with Miss Pauling, Medic and Demoman. Scout is elated upon seeing Miss Pauling again, immediately complimenting how she looked (despite Miss Pauling being covered in blood and losing weight from blood loss). Eventually, Scout just admits that he's glad to see her safe before embracing her - an action which forces the blood inside Miss Pauling to spurt out of her eye sockets, which Medic then advises not to do. Heavy is also reunited with his sister Zhanna, and is taken aback by why she's following the team, along with the mysterious disappearance of her left hand; she explains that removing her hand was necessary "to kill woman torturing her" (the TFC Pyro). Heavy accepts the explanation, but then notices the necklace of ears around her neck. Heavy quietly murmurs "Sister, NO." before Soldier comes up and hits him in the chest playfully, breaking the news that that he would officially be his "brother-in-law" (and Heavy becoming Soldier's grandfather if he "impregnated" Heavy's sister, as Zhanna mentions).
A while later, Scout gives Miss Pauling a rather self-centered breakdown of the events back at Ayers Rock, including how it was a fake rock hiding the final (and completely missing) stash of Australium. Miss Pauling asks if he knew who took the Australium, and Scout admits that they had nothing except Saxton Hale, who they found while at the stash and was presumably standing right behind him. However, turning around revealed that Saxton Hale was nowhere to be found; instead, a battalion of whirring robots mercenaries were standing right behind them the entire time.
In actuality, Saxton Hale and Maggie were still in their plane, too engrossed with reminiscing their old escapades to remember jumping of their plane to accompany Heavy and Scout (who had jumped out an hour ago). Their bonding time is broken by the calls of their pilot Jerry, who notifies them that they are out of fuel. After Saxton Hale admits to Maggie that time always flies when they chat, he prepares some airborne cargo for dropoff while suggesting that she should accompany him once Gray Mann's Australium is back in their hands and Charles Darling gives Mann Co. back. Maggie shows sadness as she puts on her parachute, and doesn't respond to Hale's offer.
Pages
Page 1
Page 2
Page 3
Page 4
Page 5
Page 6
Page 7
Page 8
Page 9
Page 10
Page 11
Page 12
Page 13
Page 14
Page 15
Page 16
Page 17
Page 18
Page 19
Page 20
Page 21
Page 22
Page 23
Page 24
Page 25
Page 26
Page 27
Page 28
Page 29
Page 30
Page 31
Page 32
Page 33
Page 34
Page 35
Page 36
Page 37
Page 38
Page 39
Page 40
Page 41
Page 42
Page 43
Page 44
Page 45
Page 46
Page 47
Page 48
Page 49
Page 50
Page 51
Page 52
Page 53
Page 54
Page 55
Page 56
Page 57
Page 58
Page 59
Page 60
Page 61
Page 62
Page 63
Page 64
Page 65
Page 66
Page 67
Page 68
Page 69
Page 70
Page 71
Page 72
Page 73
Page 74
Page 75
Page 76
Page 77
Page 78
Page 79
Page 80
Page 81
Page 82
Page 83
Page 84
Page 85
Page 86
Page 87
Page 88
Page 89
Page 90
Page 91
Page 92
Page 93
Page 94
Page 95
Page 96
Page 97
Page 98
Page 99
Page 100
Page 101
Page 102
Page 103
Page 104
Page 105
Page 106
Page 107
Page 108
Page 109
Page 110
Page 111
Page 112
Page 113
Page 114
Page 115
Page 116
Page 117
Page 118
Page 119
Page 120
Page 121
Page 122
Page 123
Page 124
Page 125
Page 126
Page 127
Page 128
Page 129
Page 130
Page 131
Page 132
Page 133
Page 134
Page 135
Page 136
Page 137
Page 138
Page 139
Page 140
Page 141
Page 142
Page 143
Page 144
Page 145
Page 146
Page 147
Page 148
Page 149
Page 150
Page 151
Page 152
Page 153
Page 154
Page 155
Page 156
Page 157
Page 158
Page 159
Page 160
Page 161
Page 162
Page 163
Page 164
Page 165
Page 166
Page 167
Page 168
Page 169
Page 170
Page 171
Page 172
Page 173
Page 174
Page 175
Page 176
Page 177
Page 178
Page 179
Page 180
Page 181
Page 182
Page 183
Page 184
Page 185
Page 186
Page 187
Page 188
Page 189
Page 190
Page 191
Page 192
Page 193
Page 194
Page 195
Page 196
Page 197
Page 198
Page 199
Page 200
Page 201
Page 202
Page 203
Page 204
Page 205
Page 206
Page 207
Page 208
Page 209
Page 210
Page 211
Page 212
Page 213
Page 214
Page 215
Page 216
Page 217
Page 218
Page 219
Page 220
Page 221
Page 222
Page 223
Page 224
Page 225
Page 226
Page 227
Page 228
Page 229
Page 230
Page 231
Page 232
Page 233
Page 234
Page 235
Page 236
Page 237
Page 238
Page 239
Page 240
Page 241
Page 242
Page 243
Page 244
Page 245
Page 246
Page 247
Page 248
Page 249
Page 250
Page 251
Page 252
Page 253
Page 254
Page 255
Page 256
Page 257
Page 258
Page 259
Page 260
Page 261
Page 262
Page 263
Page 264
Page 265
Page 266
Page 267
Page 268
Page 269
Page 270
Page 271
Page 272
Page 273
Page 274
Trivia
- Parts of several classes' names are mentioned for the first time.
- The Spy calls the Scout "Jeremy" while he is disguised as Tom Jones.
- The "Devil" addresses the Medic as Mr. Ludwig, a common German name.
- The Demoman is seen drinking from a bottle of hydrogen peroxide on Page 88. However, hydrogen peroxide is only safe to consume if highly diluted with water (3% per bottle) and in small amounts, as it can induce vomiting and foaming in the stomach.
- On Page 155, the Spy mentions that his jacket is made by a brand named Louis Crabbemarché. Loosely translated, "Crabbemarché" is French for "crab walking", a homage to the Spycrab fad, while "Louis" is a reference to the designer brand Louis Vuitton.
- When the Scout jokingly mentions that his father is Tom Jones, his personification of "God" interrupts his own sentence before unconvincingly correcting himself and saying that the Scout's dad was definitely Tom Jones. This continues the running gag and theory that the Spy is the Scout's biological father.
- The scene in which Saxton Hale jumps out of his plane with Jerry clinging onto Maggie and screaming on the way down is similar to Page 7 of Ring of Fired.
- On Page 256, the Medic is seen cradling a bandana-wearing baby baboon in the background, seemingly hinting at the success of his "Baboon Pregnancy Inducer" and the TFC Heavy's fate.
Cover page
- The cover page for this comic is based on the cover of Crisis on Infinite Earths Book 7.
- The Medic is shown with two large wounds that would fit the injuries made by the TFC team's robots, instead of the Pistol wounds caused in the comic itself.
- The background showcases every notable character who has made an appearance in Team Fortress 2 comics and media, excluding several characters such as Francis the Talking France.
- There is a lamp wearing a Magistrate's Mullet on the left side, above the Heavy Robot. This is a reference to Page 22 of Unhappy Returns, where the Scout mentions that he once had a lamp for a public defendant.
