Am I missing the reference in the last panel of 560

[The Pale King]

In the last panel of this comic (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0560.html), I have never got the reference. Can someone explain it to me?

[Assassin89]

Cyclops is one of the X-men, and it also refers to the creature on the island of the Cyclopes in the Odyssey.

[Nimrod's Son]

Meanwhile, his team-mate (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_(comics)) was in Rhodes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_of_Rhodes).

[hoosier]

Yeah, its from the time where Odysseus and his companions are captured by the Cyclops known as Polyphemus, an evil sheep-herder dude who IIRC lived in Sicily. Odysseus (or Ulysses in the Latin of Rome) blinds him and they escape his cave by tying themselves to the underside of the sheep when they go out to graze.

[shadzar]

Yeah, its from the time where Odysseus and his companions are captured by the Cyclops known as Polyphemus, an evil sheep-herder dude who IIRC lived in Sicily. Odysseus (or Ulysses in the Latin of Rome) blinds him and they escape his cave by tying themselves to the underside of the sheep when they go out to graze.

:smalleek: Damn how did I miss that connection. I just thought it was the super-hero joke!

Next thing you know Elan will be stuck between a rock and a hard place. :smallwink:

[Schnitzel]

:smallbiggrin:
http://oots.wikia.com/wiki/Meanwhile,_His_Teammate_Was_in_Rhodes

[Zordrath]

Wow, that article was hugely helpful, thanks. I never got half of the references in this strip before...

[Lkctgo]

Yeah, its from the time where Odysseus and his companions are captured by the Cyclops known as Polyphemus, an evil sheep-herder dude who IIRC lived in Sicily. Odysseus (or Ulysses in the Latin of Rome) blinds him and they escape his cave by tying themselves to the underside of the sheep when they go out to graze.

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

[Lemarc]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}
I could have recited that without wiki-ing it, it's only a few bits of information and it's a famous scene. But I don't remember anything about Sicily.

[Tass]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

Who doesn't know that? I mean Odysseus is one of the very few most known pieces in all of history

[Liwen]

I didn't remembered anything about Odysseus, at all, except that the piece existed and that they are Cyclop(s) involved in that story. Enough to laugh and 'get' the reference, but truly I don't think I've ever seen the piece. Maybe a part of it.

My cultural integrity is considered laughable at best, but I've played and remember by heart the complexity, story, environments and strategies for winning of over 400 hundred video and tabletop games. So I guess my cultural memory is all there.

[Cleverdan22]

Yeah, I definitely got that without searching or anything. I dunno, I do like the Odyssey a fair amount, but I hadn't read it for like two years before that strip came out.

[The Odor]

Am I only one who have read James Joyce book

[Klose_the_Sith]

Am I only one who have read James Joyce book

riverrun past eve and adams...? :smallbiggrin:

[Delorges]

Am I only one who have read James Joyce book

Read it too.
Too bad there aren't more of Joyce's books in our library. :smallfrown:

[TheBibliophile]

Damn. I just read the actual odessey and I didn't get that. Great joke, though.

[Spiky]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

Why would you Wiki? Wouldn't any normal person just pull out their copy of Homer and check it from the source?

[kpenguin]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

The majority of people with a good knowledge of Greek myth or have studied the Odyssey could have remembered that. Its a famous scene.

[Conuly]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

Seriously? Even if the Odyssey wasn't one of the great works of Western literature and a major cultural touchstone - it's just not that much information he's posted. Homer recited his entire poem from memory, as was the custom in those days.

I know that literate cultures tend to have less able memories than pre-literate cultures, as we use paper and pen as kinda "portable brains", but have you really outsourced so much of your memory to google and wikipedia that you can't remember a paragraph of information from one of the most well-known stories of all time?

[Skorj]

OK, but whats the referent for "Welcome to the Greg Initiative, station 32 the smiley face"? I'm totally not getting it.

[Dairun Cates]

OK, but whats the referent for "Welcome to the Greg Initiative, station 32 the smiley face"? I'm totally not getting it.

The Darma Initiative. Darma and Greg. Therefore, the Greg initiative.

32 is 23 backwards which is one of the mysterious numbers in Lost.

As for the Smiley Face... Dunno. It just had a Smiley face on it.

[Ozymandias9]

IIRC? If you remembered correctly? If you really could remember all this without WIKI-ing I would say you have a great memory, But we all know that you Searched it from the internet. Cue dramatic music...{Dum Dum Dum}

Really? You'd have to look up one of the most famous scenes in the Odyessy? Please tell me you at least had to read it in school, or I'll worry for the standards of literature education.