Pokémon: The Electric Tale of Pikachu #1 - Atop the Fourth Wall

Welcome to Atop the Fourth Wall, where bad comics burn. In this episode, the conclusion of the Entity storyline and a look at the first issue of a Pokémon comic!

http://atopthefourthwall.com

Originally uploaded October 31st, 2011.

ORIGINAL INFO: It’s Linkara vs. the Entity! But what are the origins of this creature and what does it have to do with Pokémon?

RUMINATIONS: When I first conceived of the Entity storyline, waaaay back during the beginning of the Vyce arc, I had originally planned on it being an actual fight (since back then, every storyline finale would be Power Rangers themed). I’d wield a Quasar Sabre from Power Rangers: Lost Galaxy and actually hit a static image of MissingNo. with it. Why that? Because after how exhausting the Mechakara finale had been and how tiring I knew the Vyce finale would be, I wanted an ending fight that would be simpler and easier to edit.

Thank God that did not come to pass.

The Cthulhu mythos is why the Entity was defeated the way it was. It was inspired by them, after all – a shapeless, all-powerful horror (its origin in this case spawned from a video game glitch as opposed to just being an old one) who would one day consume the world. So in restudying some of the mythos, trying to see if Lovecraft ever came up with a solution to their defeat, I thought more and more about this old favorite: “In his house at R'lyeh, dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.” And I was suddenly puzzled. WHY is Cthulhu dead? I’m sure it’s just because the nature of creatures like this are beyond human concepts of life or death, but if we were to look at it from a human lens, WHY is Cthulhu dead? And why is one time better than another when we’re still so inferior to it? For that matter, if the Old Gods are truly as powerful already as suggested by the mythos… why HAVEN’T they conquered everything already? On top of that, why would they need to conquer, anyway? If they’re already that powerful and if they’re beyond OUR concepts of good and evil… what benefit is there to conquer? What do they GET out of it? Now, I’m fairly certain the mythos DO have the answers to these questions (mostly a resounding, “They don’t actually care. We just see it as conquest when in reality they just accidentally stepped on us.”), but I came up with an image in my head of Cthulhu… or rather, a giant SKELETON of Cthulhu… waiting beneath the oceans, dreaming for its time… and then suddenly realizing that it had no purpose, no reason to conquer, no reason to do ANYTHING. And it accepted its fate and thus died of BOREDOM.

And THAT is how you defeat the Entity – by exposing it to pure existential horror – the meaningless of existence and the absurdity of the cosmos… and how utterly pointless its own existence was. Now I personally believe in a meaning of life, a reason for our existence, and that ultimately there is something else for us beyond this life that’s shaped by how we live this one, but that’s just speculation on my part. For a being like the Entity, who DID live in other realities and saw itself as eventually encompassing everything, the thought of utter pointlessness and lacking meaning in anything was beyond what it could fathom or want.

However, coincidentally, in the previous episode, Venom had ended the horrific, planet-ending threat of the symbiotes by making all the symbiotes commit suicide. So in-universe, it gave Linkara the inspiration to try to end the Entity threat THAT way. Also, the explanation given in the episode for why MissingNo. happens is… incomplete and a bit inaccurate. It has more to do with saving the player’s NAME so it can be replaced with “OLD MAN” vs. the sprite, but whatcha gonna do? And the reason why everyone fades back into existence in this one? Because one of the cameos at the end had them fade back in, so I decided “Eh, screw it, everyone comes back that way.”

And for the reupload, I’ve fixed up the audio hiss as with the last episode AND fixed two graphical glitches in the episode (one being a missing static effect, the other misplaced frames for when Phelous comes back into existence).