2010-09-14
Original: 2010-09-14 on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Title (top, large hand-lettered text): KNOW YOUR HYPOTHETICAL PARTICLES!
Info block (text beneath the title):
THE TACHYON: A particle that travels backward in time
STATUS: Unobserved
PRACTICAL USE: Fixing plot holes in science fiction shows
Panel 1: Two men stand in a room. A bald man in a brown shirt looks down. A man with reddish-brown hair in a green shirt holds up a sheet of paper (a script) and speaks.
Man in green shirt: "Deric! How come the psychic character didn't anticipate her friend's betrayal?"
Panel 2: The bald man (Deric), now wearing dark goggles/sunglasses, grimaces. A label points to him reading "TACHYON BEAM."
Deric: "STAND BACK!"
Panel 3: Deric, wearing goggles and a brown shirt, fires a beam from a device labeled "TACHYON BEAM" at the sheet of paper held by the green-shirted man. The paper glows green with a sound effect.
Sound effect: "BZZH!"
Panel 4 (caption box, screenplay format):
Cut to:
Int. Dark Room
Psylika
Strange... I'm getting a tachyon signature from...from YOU, McTraitor!
(A small inset panel beside the box shows the green-shirted man holding a bucket, looking unwell.)
Votey:
Header: TACHYON COMMUNICATION!
Hand-lettered text: Tomorrow's SMBC will involve religion, science, dating, or a dick joke.
Info block (text beneath the title):
THE TACHYON: A particle that travels backward in time
STATUS: Unobserved
PRACTICAL USE: Fixing plot holes in science fiction shows
Panel 1: Two men stand in a room. A bald man in a brown shirt looks down. A man with reddish-brown hair in a green shirt holds up a sheet of paper (a script) and speaks.
Man in green shirt: "Deric! How come the psychic character didn't anticipate her friend's betrayal?"
Panel 2: The bald man (Deric), now wearing dark goggles/sunglasses, grimaces. A label points to him reading "TACHYON BEAM."
Deric: "STAND BACK!"
Panel 3: Deric, wearing goggles and a brown shirt, fires a beam from a device labeled "TACHYON BEAM" at the sheet of paper held by the green-shirted man. The paper glows green with a sound effect.
Sound effect: "BZZH!"
Panel 4 (caption box, screenplay format):
Cut to:
Int. Dark Room
Psylika
Strange... I'm getting a tachyon signature from...from YOU, McTraitor!
(A small inset panel beside the box shows the green-shirted man holding a bucket, looking unwell.)
Votey:
Header: TACHYON COMMUNICATION!
Hand-lettered text: Tomorrow's SMBC will involve religion, science, dating, or a dick joke.
Alt text
A comic titled "Know Your Hypothetical Particles!" An info block explains: the tachyon is a particle that travels backward in time, its status is unobserved, and its practical use is "fixing plot holes in science fiction shows." In the first panel, a man in a green shirt holds up a script and asks a bald man named Deric why the psychic character in a sci-fi show didn't anticipate her friend's betrayal. In the next panels, Deric dons dark goggles, shouts "Stand back!", and fires a "tachyon beam" device at the script, which glows green with a "BZZH!" The final panel is written as a screenplay scene: in a dark room, a character named Psylika now says "Strange... I'm getting a tachyon signature from...from YOU, McTraitor!" retroactively explaining the plot hole, while the green-shirted man looks queasy holding a bucket. The joke: tachyons traveling backward in time are used to patch story holes by injecting foreshadowing into already-written scenes. Votey aftercomic, headed "Tachyon Communication!", reads: "Tomorrow's SMBC will involve religion, science, dating, or a dick joke."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.