26 Responses to Chapter 1 | Page 03

  1. Dreadogastus says:

    Nice lounge chair in the back of panel 2.

    • mvandinter says:

      It’s nice I guess, though I can’t honestly image any of the characters in this story (see Prologue) lounging sumptuously in the thing.

  2. E
    Ed8 says:

    Fah! Book Lessons! Who needs ’em? They just teach you about silly things like cavemen and dinosaurs – stuff that has no practical application in real life whatsoever!

    • mvandinter says:

      In the historical setting of this story, anthropology and archaeology didn’t exist yet, and would only become subjects of scientific study when legions of European aristocrats began exploring the center of the Earth in their giant steam-powered drilling machines.

      • E
        Ed8 says:

        Of course, it all makes perfect sense now: no wonder she doesn’t like book lessons. Who would want to read a book with no dinosaurs in it? 😀

        • Aslandus says:

          “This one has giant squids! They’re sort of like dinosaurs…”
          “It’s an autobiography, so it’s still boring”

  3. T
    Thorin Schmidt says:

    Apparently, no one wants you to hang about in the library. nary a seat to be seen. “Get your book, then GET OUT!”…

    also, this just occured to me… without a launch scaffold of some sort, to hold the machine in place, once the drill starts “drilling”, the only thing likely to happen is that everyone in it will go on a crazy spin-cycle ride… (Kind of like the ‘Finnish Fling’ at Worlds of Fun”)

    • Lilithmae says:

      I think that below the window is a seat, actually. Looks like it would hold at the most maybe three people all squished together, though. XD

      • mvandinter says:

        Honestly, after drawing all those little books on the shelves, I had no desire to draw a bunch of furniture.

        • E
          Ed8 says:

          There’s only so much time avalable, of course – I can only imagine how much time it took to painstakingly draw frame#4 Alice to be *exactly* the same as frame#1 Alice. 😉 (I think the shadowing on her skirt is a bit different, though)

          • mvandinter says:

            If only it had occurred to me to make a graphic novel version of Punch & Judy, I could have reused the same 2 drawings over and over again and be done with the thing before breakfast!

          • davidbreslin101 says:

            Well, it IS the 1820s- modern artists can do marvelous things with P G Stubbins’s Patent “Tracing Paper”.

            • mvandinter says:

              Tracing paper!!! Why didn’t I think of that?… Wait, did I literally draw this page in the 1820s?

              • E
                Ed8 says:

                Clearly you did. (or at least sometime in that same century) The author’s blurb on Amazon clearly states that Matthew Van Dinter died nearly a century ago. Amazon would not lie.

    • w
      wintermute says:

      I think that Philo was attempting to build a spin-cycle ride and open the first theme park in England (truly a man ahead of his time).

      It was only due to an unfortunate miscalculation that he ends up boring into the center of the Earth. (The Unearth, if you will.)

  4. T
    Thorin Schmidt says:

    Okay, did you do that on purpose? I notice that Alice, who is continuing to harp on about her Fiance, is doing so EXACTLY CENTERED between a Harp, and a Harpsichord. Truly, I didn’t think you would stoop so low as this… Visual Puns????? Really?

    • mvandinter says:

      Oh, yeah, sure. I definitely did that on purpose alright. No doubt about it. I’m clever like that. I am. I swear. Yep.

      • Apvogt says:

        Seems legit.
        @Thorin Schmidt
        I’ll never understand the difference between a harpsichord and a piano.

        • T
          Thorin Schmidt says:

          @Apvogt
          If you ever get the chance to hear one, it’ll be obvious. The main difference though, just on the off chance you’re curious, is that a piano has little hammers that hit the strings, and a harpsichord has little “fingers” attached that double-pluck the strings when a key is pressed…

          this is why no one in my family will play Trivial Pursuit with me anymore…

          • N
            Nerdolinium says:

            Also harpsichords cannot really vary their volume, while pianos were specifically designed to do so; the name “piano” comes from “pianoforte”, a colloquialism for “piano e forte”, meaning “soft and loud”.

          • Apvogt says:

            This is kind of freaky but I posted that at 6, then went sleep, then went to my music appreciation college class at 9 and we talked about harps and PIANOS AND HARPSICORDS.

            • mvandinter says:

              Wow. Harpsicords seem to be a popular topic among Unearth readers. I wonder how I can work that into the story line. Any suggestions?

              • w
                wintermute says:

                There will be a harpsichord aboard the drilling machine (of course, what proper English gigantic contraption doesn’t contain a sitting room for receiving guests?) – and “Her Highness” will be enthralled and greatly desire it.

                Musical instruments in the center of the earth have been limited to dinosaur bone xylophones, skin stretched over frames to make drums, and horns made of hollowed-out stalactites and stalagmites. The harpsichord will be a sensation.

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