Final Quest #24

The perspective on Savah's Tower seems messed up. Looking at the bottom it looks like it should be in the foreground but Savaa and the first commer troll are so tiny they look like they're supposed to be in the mid ground at least.

Oh, for heaven's sake. They had a preserver right there!

A) why did Rayek take him up to that hill, anyway?

B) why did they not put Shuna in wrapstuff so Leetah could heal Cutter? Or vice-versa?

Because critical thinking "is not the Way"

More to the point, Wendy had decided to kill him off, so logic doesn’t come into it.

wingthing wrote:

Because critical thinking "is not the Way"

Most pointless death ever. What the fuck. He just decides to die like that?

Cutlet doesn't look tan enough ehh he looks weird in general actually

I've just realized - Leetah and Skywise STILL don't know about TimTam?!? O.O

Or - have I missed something? That's kinda ridiculous.

Leetah knows. Skywise is"self-blinded to the truth" if I recall the wording.

He.has.recognized.BOTH.

"... knowing all that you are ..." in this case turned into 'clueless about your very self'. "Breaking all the rules" is no fun. :/

*must look up when exactly Leetah realized*

I think she realized it sometime after ordering their second recognition because the dialogue there was her saying let "let me work through this." And when Skywise and Tmmain recognized as the palace was leaving Leetah indicated that she knew and wondered if Skywise knew now. That is when the narration said something about Skywise being self blinded.

*vaguely remembers Leetah wondering now*

Thank you, manga. I know wherre to look for it now.

Pointless, somewhat constructed too many open possibilities unused (e.g. the above mentioned wrapstuff, why there at all,...), and what Stargazer wrote in the spoiler part.


I think the sole reason is "EQ is over". Kill the main character for it to be over. So we need to make up a reason, find something, give it this new age touch or whatever this is. Perfect.

And maybe a way to let go for Wendy.


All in all I still think FQ is not the best part of ElfQuest history, no matter what people will write elsewhere.

Imo the FQ is the weakest installment of all ElfQuest. The story is all over the place. Too many timeskips. It basically feels like a checklist of plotpoints that needed to be taken care of. The human enemies were as one dimensional as they could be and in the end no progress was made with Winnowill at all. All the past deaths have been pretty meaningless except maybe for Ruffel's (ironically). As I am writing this sentence I realize almost forgot Moonshade died too, so yeah. That's how much impact FQ makes on me lately.

What I would've liked to see was more background story about all the other elfs we didn't know yet (like the fire elves or others that came to the palace because except for Dre-Ahn we barely saw anything of them) but we didn't get that unfortunately /rant

I was thinking back to "The Searcher and the Sword" and to Shuna's words about how in her we see the benevolent truth to all the stories about elves kidnapping human children to raise as their own and it occurred to me that she speaks as if her story is the only kind of story of elf adoption. But the biggest bombshell of FQ and one of the most egregiously unused points was that there are in fact other elves out there blended into the human populations. So all of those other tales of elves stealing children may be perfectly true as well.

I literally just finished the issue and I'm going to need some time to digest, but I'll come right out and say, I love that Cutter died. EQ is his story, really. Sure, there are a few really major supporting characters, a rich tapestry of tertiary characters, some intermittently wonderful antagonists (not looking at you, war-chief...) but Cutter is the heart of the story, and I do feel it was fitting for his story to end. It was also telegraphed pretty clearly, in retrospect. Ember is chief of the wolfriders, his personality was altered by the revelation of his connection with Timmain, his soul will live on in another body, his soul-brother is gone--his story had reached its close.

And I really did like that it was a simple spider bite that did him in. No grand sacrifice, no valor, no glory, just a moment's bad luck. Ain't that life? The fact that it tied back to his birth was pretty poetic. I loved that the father tree sprouted from his body, tying back into his stated desire to be the seed and the branches and the leaves, etc. Winnowill refusing to help in the final moments was brutal. There was something a propos about Cutter being with Rayek when the end came, especially when death is yet another thing that Rayek cannot have.

But with all that praise out of the way...there were so many plot contrivances in this thing you really couldn't think too hard about why things were happening. There needed to be a much more immediate choice between Shuna's life and Cutter's. I just don't believe she's that important. The humans' rage would eventually burn itself out....or not. I don't really think it would have made a significant difference one way or another, and that really undercuts the nobility Cutter's choice and makes it look more like straight-up suicide, which seems pretty selfish for a guy who still has a family. Cutter seemed a bit too happy to die for an elf that was about to become a father again. Maybe if he sent an apology of some kind to Leetah? Or expressed just a hint of wistfulness along with calm acceptance.

It really annoyed me that Skywise appeared. I mean, honestly, they just left! We were supposed to be sad about them leaving and never seeing each other again. Sheesh. The palace is such BS. It's the biggest problem in FQ. I was both touched when Skywise placed the lodestone around Cutter's neck and confused. That would have been a profoundly sad moment in an alternate universe version of FQ in which death still packed a punch and Cutter's death was any kind of real loss.

So I guess my feeling is we got to a lovely place with the ending, but it was built on such shaky foundations I'm afraid to look too closely lest the whole thing come crashing down.

Other random thoughts: it looks like Timmain and Skywise had a little silver-haired girl...I guess completionists can round-up to Jink if so inclined. Cutter's son's hair is wild. He looks like a Cutter duplicate, tbh, which is both sweet and sort of...enh. I still don't appreciate Dr. Dre and it looks like he and Freetouch are together at the end, what a bizarre couple. Shuna is so old. I think her and Cutter's deaths could have been nice complements, but I'm not upset that she's still kicking around. I was genuinely shocked that Strongbow left with Skywise. Like, wtf is he going to do in the krystal kingdom? I didn't see him on the big two-page spread.

Overall, I appreciate this issue. It was obviously a labor of love and I think a lot of thought and planning went into it. And I think in this issue, a lot of things worked successfully, at least for me. The problems in it are endemic to FQ as a whole (i.e. the overpowered palace, the undercutting of death as a concept, the lack of clarity/believability with respect to the humans' behaviors and motivations.) But I can definitely appreciate this issue as a final chapter, and there was a lot to admire in it.

Why should Shuna be so important to the indigenous tribes? Why should her stabbing (of which they should know nothing about) be more important than the countless deaths of friends and family?

I googled death by spider bites and as thought, it's really rare. Well, at least I have the "random Wolfrider death*" I was asking for. Maybe a coconut would've been better XD

Timmain must be one of the ugliest elves... And Skywise should burn his clothes. I think that's a daughter.

I disliked how Cutter's body was merged with the little palace, the lodestone and some plant seeds to become some magical tree

Cutlet looks like he might challenge Ember for leadership at some point

Treestump now lived under four chiefs  





*you know, short and sharp lives


[Edit: Apparently I wrote this the same time as Wisp]

When Leetah says she'll join Cutter when the time is right, do you think she means she plans to die (maybe as the first High one to voluntarily take on mortality) or just go join the others on the new home world?

What happened with Cutter's soul anyway? Is it still a individual part or did it re-merge with Timmain's?

So a spider bite did Cutter in, like one very nearly did moments after Joyleaf gave birth to him? Groan.

...unless... it was the EXACT SAME SPIDER!! Now that would be one for the books.

If elves had books, that is.

So this entire story was basically about depression and finding the best, or maybe just the most poetic, way to die... yet kinda live on as someone different?

I'd actually be alright with that, but the problem has been hyping everything up and with the frankly moronic cliffhangers in almost every issue pretending that this would be an intense story of action and danger. As a quiet contemplative story of Cutter realizing that he can't let go of the past and counting time and life holds little joy for him, this might work as a story. But that's not what they presented it to be!

Ugh, maybe knowing what I now know the entire final quest will be an easier read with only occational rolling at the eyes at the last few pages of every issue.

Also Cutlet looks like a paler Sunstream. How boring...

Miss Gillespie wrote:

What happened with Cutter's soul anyway? Is it still a individual part or did it re-merge with Timmain's?

That's my problem with Tim-Tam. Cutter is now worse than dead. He's one relatively short stream of memories belonging to someone who has lived tens of millions of years.

There is no one for Leetah to go and be with "one day."

Egg said there was one thread in the Scroll that suggested telling Cutter this truth may have destroyed him. It looks like it did. I just wish I understood why Timmain thought it was necessary.

Or maybe since he was a piece of her she doesn't think as anything more than cutting her hair and as little matter to anyone else.

That would be poetic and tragic though, wouldn't it? If larger-than-life Cutter would lack the one thing all ordinary elves have, a soul, a disembodied consciousness.
But while I have a thing for bitter, sad and tragic stories, that doesn't really work for canon EQ, does it?

In fact, I don't think that Cutter merged with Timmain in Wendy's head. Maybe the wolf part of his soul will keep him separated?

Unless "going to Cutter" means actually going to Timmain and Skywise. If Timmain is basically Cutter, together with Skywise they would form the old three-some

*howls in mourn*

I think it's fitting that Cutter dies in the end. It would have been cool that he died of such a random, not epic thing, but I feel like FQ was just random things happening. If there was a main theme like Cutter aging I missed it. Maybe one day I'll read the series back and see it and be blown away.

Whelp... I guess that's done.
I'm not sure how to express my reactions to this issue, there was howling, but it was more of outrage than sorrow. Sorrow yes, for the end of a beloved series, but the sorrow came a bit later, my prime feeling was one of outrage. I'm not mad they ended the series by killing off the Main main character, I'm mad that the death was beyond completely pointless and played off as somehow poetic or noble or some trolldung. Like Kimo's "Dropping a Leaf" speech, it was contrived and hollow.
The thing with Stongbow played out to an equally contrived and utterly stupid end. Moonshade's pointless sacrifice was made somehow even more pointless by Stongbow giving in and going to "live" in the palace?!? What?? Whhhhyyyyyyyyyyy!?!?!?! So Moonshade's spirit can spend the rest of eternity telling you how you should have listened to her in the first place?
What about Dre-ann? What About Dre-ann!?!? I sat through this whole series waiting for us to finally get some sort of reveal, or him to pull some Silent Bob thing where he only speaks to utter Great Truths, but no, they just sort of threw him out there as a half-formed character that they didn't know what to do with so he's just sort humming theme music in the background for no apparent reason.