The Plumber's Ledger: Volume 11, Issue 2

THE

IN THIS ISSUE

Front Cover Photograph

by Etienne Delorieux on Unsplash

Back Cover Illustration

by Ann Trinh

Published by THE ENGINEERING UNDERGRAD UATE SOCIETY, a student society at McGill Uni versity. The content of this publication is the sole responsibility of THE ENGINEERING UNDER GRADUATE SOCIETY and does not necessarily represent the views of McGill University.

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Return of the Obra Dinn Review By Aman Sidhu

Naur, Not Gore! By Awais Khaliq

The Poppy War - A Review By Bianca Dubois

Did you Know? Inktober Controversy By Ann Trinh

From the Archives: McGill Killer By Charlotte Volk

Volume 11, Issue 2 October 2022

THE TEAM

Editors-in-Chief

Bianca Dubois

Ann Trinh

Contributers

Aman Sidhu

Awais Khaliq

Editors

Awais Khaliq Salma El Hamzawy

Illustrators

Naomi Askenazi

Publications Director Charlotte Volk

LETTER from the Editors-in-Chief

In our second issue of the year, the Ledger welcomes new writers, ed itors, and illustrators! For anyone interested in getting involved in any part of the publication process, feel free to contact us through our social media or by email.

Are there any horror movie lovers in the crowd? If yes, then you may have watched the new slasher film “Pearl” directed by Ti West and star ring Mia Goth. Awais Khaliq sure has. Check out Awais Khaliq’s dis cussion on the slasher genre and Khaliq’s thoughts on how “Pearl” fits into this genre.

Maybe you’re looking for a new video game now that midterms are finally easing up. Aman Sidhu’s review of The Return of Obra Dinn might be just what you need to get started.

We can’t forget our favorite bookworm... take a look at Bianca Dubois’ review of The Poppy War trilogy by R.F. Kuang. Have you ever heard of Dr. Thomas Neill Cream? Well, he is a McGill alumnus but also a killer. Read more about the crimes of Cream in Charlotte Volk’s “From the Archives” piece.

Not only is October coming to an end but also the much loved Inktober event, which wasn’t very loved in the past. Learn about the Inktober controversy that shook the art community back in 2020.

We hope that midterms are finally wrapping up and that you can all fully enjoy the spooky season in all its festive glory.

All the best,

Ann and Bianca

RETURN OF THE OBRA DINN REVIEW

BY AMAN SIDHU

Please do not bother reading this ar ticle. Just buy the game. Understandably, if you would rather not, please continue to read. I hope to convince you anyway.

This game is good, and I sincere ly believe that jumping into it with minimal context is the best way to experience it. With that in mind, I will structure the review so it will progressively cover more and more spoilers. If you are intrigued by the initial premise, feel free to stop and experience all this game has to of fer, letting it speak for itself better than whatever I can translate. Also, the game is a mystery; if you find yourself any bit interested, please stop, avoid reading into it, and buy the game. This complete review is for anyone who takes recommenda tions in their entirety.

One-sentence description: “Return of the Obra Dinn,” devel oped in 2018 by the same creator of “Papers, Please” Lucas Pope, is a mystery, adventure, puzzle game that requires the player to solve a series of whodunit-like cases on a derelict ship, The Obra Dinn.

Premise: “Return of the Obra Dinn” finds you playing as a local Insurance in vestigator tasked with exploring a derelict ship whose crew has been lost at sea for five years. While the character you play is an insurance

agent, you quickly assume the role of a detective as you begin to piece together what happened to each member aboard the Obra Dinn. At the start of the game, you only have a few things, but enough to help you on your journey. In your inventory, you have: an odd, old stopwatch that allows the user to peer back to the time of death of another person, a ledger that records all the relevant details you come across in each case you explore on the ship, and other miscellaneous pieces of information whose purpose is realized as you play. To fully complete your task, you must determine the fate of each of the 60 members of the crew on your own, determining the cause of death, as well as, naming every sin gle crew member.

Spoiler Zone (Starts broad, then talks about specifics):

What drew me into the game was the promise of a mystery/detective game like no other, and the game just delivers. The presentation of the game’s pixelized, black-and-white world immerses you in what feels like an old T.V. detective drama of the same look. Yet its ability to sur prise you with striking imagery and set-pieces despite its deceptively simple-looking graphics fills already lively scenes with an added layer of awe. It was always a treat to look at. The cases you explore are structured in several distinct chapters that form the main narrative. They cov

er different peculiar events aboard the ship en route to its destina tion. These chapters are introduced non-linearly and often in reverse order of how they chronologically play out, which made me feel like I was watching Memento for the first time (good movie, go buy that too). Chapters also emphasize a string of deaths that occur during that event. Each time you step back in time through the use of the stop watch, you are greeted first by only the voices of the present characters, then you are thrust into dioramas that capture a slice in time where someone has died. However, despite having this seemingly fantastical ability to go back in time, the game is not as straightforward with its problems. This therein lies the beau ty of the game; it is the attention and care that went into crafting a com plex yet coherent mystery where clues are scattered in every form of information provided to the player. Perhaps the most challenging part of the game, albeit probably the most satisfying, is determining the names of each person on the ship. The game rarely gives handouts with giving blatant name drops or even the rank/occupation of the charac ters in a scene, so it encourages in ferring and deductive reasoning as the primary way to problem-solve. This concept is not taken for grant ed, which is why I love the game so much. It actually makes you feel like Batman, for real. Anytime that I thought I could exploit a piece of information, I always found an op

portunity to, and I was rewarded for doing so. If I can share a moment I had (go to the OVER HERE to skip this hint), it would be the realiza tion that a map given to you at the start contains specific information about the living quarters for each occupation on the ship (i.e. carpen ters room, treasurer room). The first case in a chapter often happens in the middle of what I like to call “a day in the life,” meaning that peo ple are generally at their stations on the ship. From this, I could quickly deduce the character’s jobs purely by the room they were in. OVER HERE This is just one of the many examples the games provide as in stances where the solution does not lie by looking around the diorama or listening to the dialogue. It is also a testament to how organized the ledger you are given at the start is, and the quality of its UI to allow the player to quickly flip through the book and discern, at a glance, a wide

range of information in a digestible fashion.

for the game is also so good. The music’s role is to quickly convey the emotion in the current flashback, capturing the energy of the dread to the plain hysteria present in so many of the scenes. This becomes juxtaposed with the quiet serenity of the boat when you finally snap back to reality, reminding you just how dead the ship is.

End of Spoiler Zone

Closing thoughts (Spoiler free):

I will admit I was holding back on that intro because, like the deaths you come across, there is so much more going on. To reiterate, when I say the cause of death, I mean that the game wants you to articulate, in the best way you can, a sentence explaining their death, given a set of phrases from a word bank. For example, was someone murdered? Great, now tell me how they died (gun, crushed, overboard), the name of who died (Billy, Bobby, Bo), and tell me the name of the killer (Bil li, Boby, Boe). As will come quickly apparent, the “name game” becomes an integral part of closing out cases of each individual, and the matter of fact of the death itself is often trivial in comparison.

There is not much left to say about the game, however, the soundtrack

To close, in my personal opinion, a good game is like a good meal, it makes you say “goddamn” like how my friend Sam says it, and leaves you asking for more. But in this case, you will be asking for amne sia when you beat the game because it is that good. To rate the game, I don’t like using one specific rating scale, so the best way to describe my rating would be to say: This is like the Mike Wazowski of video games, or the “Trouble Man” of Mystery Whodunits.

(Spoiler Free)

The game is available on Playstation, Xbox, Switch, and PC. I personally bought the game on Steam, and it ran great on my 6GB Nvidia 1060, 8 GB of RAM, with 3 Chrome tabs open, and it is $22.79 at the time of writing. If you do not want my word for it, there is currently an “Over whelming Positive” rating for the game on Steam, and it has an 89 on Metacritic. It took me around 8 hours to beat, but please remember that I am a professional, so it is basi cally impossible to beat the game in less time.

Go buy it, weeeeeeeeeeeeeee. ◆

Photo from https://store.steampowered.com/

NAUR, NOT GORE!

BY AWAIS KHALIQ

Fifth or sixth row from the front, in the middle of the row but slightly to the right. That’s where I usually sit at the movies. B10 or C10, or E10 if it’s an especially busy night. Climb ing up the Forum or Banque Scotia escalators, a safety net awaits you at the top, where the impending ther modynamics assignment and the many other worldly worries seem far away, even though only three storeys guard you against the ter rors of Sainte-Catherine. The waft of popcorn covered in the nastiest butter known to humankind and the soda-encrusted chairs—there’s something special about all that. A few weeks ago, I felt the same hom eyness as I entered Salle 09 to watch the marvelous Pearl (2022) by Ti West, sequel to X (2021).

A new-age slasher film, Pearl has a main character of the same name succumbing to her murderous im pulses, picking off everyone who threatens her dreams of being a star, and a goose who honked too loud, I guess. With the production team and music composer underlining the setting of the film at the cusp of the Roaring Twenties, and an in credible performance by lead actress Mia Goth, I see few flaws with Pearl. Nonetheless, the slasher genre is a divisive one, and for very valid rea sons. It has been plagued with prej udice and can normalise extreme violence, yet it also provides peace and often harmless excitement to so many audiences, so where do we draw a line?

If you want to know what slasher is

at its very core, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and the Halloween and Friday the 13th franchises are good places to start. Although slasher movies can trace their roots back to the 60s with the Italian Giallo mov ies and Alfred Hitchcock’s infamous Psycho, it wasn’t until the early 80s that it developed a true identity with a formula that would be used over and over again for years to come. The final girl, the favouring of short-range weapons, trauma as the motive for the killer, and stalking the victims are examples of key ele ments within this formula. The final girl trope enforces the idea that the only character to survive the killer’s rampage ought to be a girl—ideally, a virgin. Other problematic tropes also exist, such as the unspoken rule that a Black character can never survive. However, the quintessential reason why some people are turned off by slashers is rather because of the sheer scale of violence, and how it impacts the viewer.

For instance, one of the most con troversial releases of the year has been Dahmer—Monster: The Jef frey Dahmer Story. This much-talk ed about series re-enacts the luring and killing of countless men, mostly queer Black and Brown men. Unfor tunately, its sudden popularity has inspired many people to create dis turbing content glorifying Dahmer. Whether it be a tweet hyping up his looks, or a TikTok cosplaying as him, it seems a select group of people have taken a liking to the serial killer. For example, this tweet I stumbled upon not too long ago:

“GUYS THE WAY HE ASKS HES SO POLITE AND ADORABLE IM GNA CRY,” regarding an Interview Dahmer did with Inside Edition. To this, other users agreed: “HES ADORABLE IM CRYING OH MY GOD HIM,” writes user @Dahmers DeadBF (now deactivated). “hes so adorable im gonna cry,” tweeted a user with a Richard Ramirez profile picture. Now, Twitter may be the shithole of the Internet, but Netflix has enabled users to glorify a mon ster and desecrate innocent queer men by creating a show which blurs the line between documentary and tribute.

In particular, the decision to have the narrative led by Jeffrey Dahmer may have led viewers astray. This creative direction put the victims on the sidelines when their suffer ing should have been centred, so viewers could truly understand the

Illustration by Naomi Askenazi

scale of Dahmer’s crimes. He stole the lives of at least 17 men, and the series doesn’t insist on that nearly enough. Instead of showcasing how beautiful these people were, and how much their families suffered, crucial minutes are dedicated to showing Dahmer masturbating to roadkill. While it is essential to show just how messed-up he was, the victims also deserve detailing. They don’t de serve to be side characters because they were real people whose lives were cut short. So, a compromise should’ve been reached between the different stories at hand, but Netflix missed the target significantly. And shoving in a little police criticism at the very end did not gloss over all these issues. Not to mention, the creators didn’t bother consulting the victims’ families during the creation process.

For some, watching Dahmer murder men may not have been an arduous task. It’s just a Netflix show they’re watching on their smartphone, but for others, including me, it’s so much more. As a queer Brown man, watching Monster was so mentally taxing that I had to watch it over a few weeks to avoid a mental break down. Many can’t relate to the fears of queer men, and that’s fine. How ever, choosing to ignore these fears is an issue. This show could’ve been a bridge between communities and stories, but instead, the direction

Netflix chose is a hole in the ground that serves as food for the fantasies of weirdos. This is because Netflix has chosen to market true crime as entertainment instead of education, an error committed far too often nowadays.

Anyways, what does all of this have

to do with Pearl? Well, the glorifica tion of killing that Dahmer fans en gage in has been considered one of the consequences of slasher movies. The main difference between true crime and slasher is that one is fic tional while the other is very real. Regardless, why on Earth do people watch slasher movies? By keeping you on the edge of your seat, these flicks provide a distraction, if only for two hours. Moreover, therapist Alicia Clark states that “channelling everyday anxiety into something more focused and acute that’s about something and someone else, ap pears to offer some relief from what’s going on inside [you].” Hence, there are valid reasons why someone would seek out a gore-filled film. Regarding the trivialisation of suf fering, the problem lies not with the slashers but with what you take from them. Going ahead and idolising se rial killers is the wrong path, while harmlessly enjoying something that gives you relief from Calculus and existentialism is valid. This is not to say the genre has no shortcomings. Until recently, nearly all slasher movies were directed by White men who killed off all promiscuous char acters and seldom represented char acters of colour. But Pearl, along with other recent developments in the genre, have shown they strive to get rid of outdated tropes. This ini tiative is lacking in true crime, and all you need is a look on social me dia to see the repercussions.

By the way, if you dress up as Jeffrey Dahmer for Halloween, you are very weird. Be smart, dress up as Pearl! ◆

Illustration by Naomi Askenazi

THE POPPY WAR A REVIEW

BY BIANCA DUBOIS

TW: Genocide, Rape, Violence, Death, Abuse, Self-Harm, and Substance Abuse.

In this article I will give my thoughts on The Poppy War Tril ogy by R.F. Kuang. This triumphant series begins with the titular book and Kuang’s debut novel, The Poppy War, fol lowed by The Drag on Republic and The Burning God. This dark fantasy trilogy is inspired by Chi nese history and takes place in an fan tastical nation called Nikan. It draws ex plicitly from the Sec ond Sino-Japanese War, the Song dynas ty, and the Chinese Civil War, highlight ing the Rape of Nan king and Unit 731. However, this series also covers Chinese politics, theology, co lourism, philosophy, and provides commentary on West ern imperialism and colonialism. It is a sweeping and heart-wrenching trilogy that presents a nuanced dia logue on Asian history and culture, and does a beautiful job of opening a conversation about atrocities that have occurred.

The Poppy War’s protagonist, Rin, is written as an anti-hero during the series and undergoes a strong char acter arc. She is based on Mao Ze dong, one of the most controversial figures in Chinese history. We begin with Rin, who is an orphan from a previous colonial war, studying

for the Keju nation al exam to get into a top military academy and escape both her rural village in the South and her abu sive family. She suc ceeds in getting into a top academy. How ever, she immediate ly faces discrimina tion based on class and colorism from her peers and teach ers. Rin perseveres with her studies and begins to make some friends among the other students. In ad dition, she cultivates a relationship with an eccentric prof who takes her on as his student. With him, she uncovers her gift for shamanism and grows more comfort able in school and the capital. All of a sud den, civil war breaks out and Rin is forced to question the world she lives in, using her abilities to fight for what she believes. It is impossible to agree with Rin’s decisions and ac tions during her fight in the war, but it is equally impossible not to empa thize with her struggles and root for her success.

I will not go into the plot of The

Photo from amazon.ca

Dragon Republic and The Burning God because it is difficult to do so without giving away major spoilers for the first book. However, these novels follow the aftershocks of the conflicts within The Poppy War. These sequels examine the effects of colonialism and religious conver sion of Nikan in a fascinating way.

Kuang did a fantastic job at growing each character in ways that seemed genuine to themselves. None of the characters are meant to be likeable; nonetheless, you can’t help but grow fond of them along their journey and root for their triumphs. More over, Kuang’s writing continuously improves throughout the series as she gains more and more skill in her craft.

These books made me reflect about

history and, specifically, whose his tory I have learned about in school and pop culture. Before reading The Poppy War, I only knew a basic overview of Asian history. However, this series sucked me into its world and got me to research more about the historical context of the stories.

I initially rated The Poppy War 3/5 stars due to my issues with Rin’s actions during the novel. However, months later, the story still sticks with me and I kept returning to it, so I surprisingly decided to raise it to 5/5 stars. The sequels also receive 5 stars from me and this trilogy will go down as one of my favourites of all time. However, I would not recommend this series of books to everyone due to the heavy topics and triggers within its pages. None theless, it was a beautiful read and

an important reckoning on Asian history and identity. I cannot wait to read more of her books, start ing with Babel, or the Necessity of Violence: an Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution, re leased in August 2022.

“If you hold the fate of the country in your hands, if you have accepted your obligation to your people, then your life ceases to be your own.”

– R.F. Kuang, The Poppy War ◆

Photo from Bianca Dubois

DID YOU KNOW? INKTOBER CONTROVERSY

BY ANN TRINH

Did you know that there was an Ink tober controversy? I didn’t. Google search autofill helped me find out it existed and a reddit post kick start ed this quick piece discussing it.

Let’s begin with the basics. Hopeful ly by the end of this piece, you will notice the irony in that.

What is Inktober?

Inktober is a month-long event where artists make ink drawings over the course of the month of Oc tober. Traditionally, artists would create one drawing a day and each day would have a corresponding prompt. By the end of the month, an artist would have a grand total of 31 drawings. Nowadays, artists can make pieces bi-weekly, every other day, and other variations.

This 31-day challenge was popular ised by ink artist Jake Parker in 2009 “as a challenge to improve his inking skills and develop positive drawing habits”.

What is this Inktober controversy?

For a seemingly uncontroversial event, there was actually some dra ma surrounding the 31-day-chal lenge in 2017, 2019, as well as a larger-scale controversy in 2020. The focus of this piece will be about the 2020 controversy, which is likely what the Google autofill search was referring to.

Jake Parker was about to publish his book “Inktober All Year Long”. A tu torial book about Inktober and how to ink draw, set to be published in the Fall of 2020. Well known artist, Al phonso Dunn, made a nearly 1-hour long Youtube video in August 2020 titled “Jake Parker Plagiarised My Book”. The video delved into the striking similarities between Park er’s soon to be published book and Dunn’s 2015 published book “Pen and Ink: A Simple Guide”. Dunn tells viewers that Parker’s book is “phras[ed], organiz[ed], [and] pre sent[ed]” in jarringly similar ways. Parker, however, claims that he did not plagiarise. He along with other people in the art community have mentioned that any similarities are to be expected as both books discuss fundamental techniques that have been engraved in the art form.

What is happening now?

Inktober continues to be celebrat ed, but some artists have chosen to move away from it during the height of its drama-filled storm. They looked at Drawtober or Drawllow een as alternative events. In terms of Parker’s book, it seems that his book was published in March 2021 but is currently discontinued.

Learn more about it: Official inktober website: https:// inktober.com/

The reddit post which summarizes the inktober controversies: https:// www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/ comments/iih7sm/art_communi ty_inktober_2020_the_annual_ink/ Alphonso Dunn’s video, “Jake Park er Plagiazed My Book”: https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG3E NcAdWBM

Photo from inktober.com

FROM THE ARCHIVES: MCGILL KILLER

BY CHARLOTTE VOLK

Almost everyone has heard the name ‘Jack the Ripper’, mainly be cause prolific media and fiction coverage of his crimes has created an urban legend around him. Jack the Ripper was a serial killer who preyed on vulnerable women, all while sending taunting letters to the authorities desperately trying to capture him. To this day, his ac tual identity remains unknown and is the object of much speculation. However, some researchers believe that a McGill alumnus and Jack the Ripper were one and the same.

Dr. Thomas Neill Cream enrolled at McGill University in the Faculty of Medicine in 1872 and received his Doctor of Medicine and Mas ter of Surgery in 1876. In a sinister beginning to his career, he wrote his doctoral thesis on chloroform, a substance he would later use in his early murders. Later, he switched to strychnine, which causes convul sions and is evidence of Dr. Cream’s sadistic tendencies.

Cream’s first victim was his wife, Flora Brooks, who he married in 1876 after almost killing her during a botched abortion procedure. Brooks’ death a year later was origi nally attributed to consumption but is now believed to be chloroform poisoning. Cream’s attempt to frame a local businessman for another of his murders was unsuccessful, and he fled to Chicago, where he es tablished a medical practice near the red-light district offering illegal

abortions to prostitutes. A string of chloroform and strychnine poison ings in Chicago followed this move. Cream was eventually arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment af ter he attempted to blackmail and frame a pharmacist for one of his murders. After Cream’s brother al legedly bribed the authorities for leniency, Cream was released from prison and sailed to England, where he continued to murder, and con tinued to attempt to blackmail and frame others. In fact, it was this in sistence on accusing others that was his ultimate downfall, as the police found it suspicious for one person to have such intimate knowledge of the various murders.

Cream was convicted and hanged in 1892. Cream’s executioner claimed that his final words were “I am Jack…”, a claim which has been seized upon by “Ripperolo

gists” to connect Cream to the Jack the Ripper murders. One such re searcher, Donald Bell, draws paral lels between the crimes: both kill ers targeted prostitutes, both wrote taunting letters to the authorities, and their murders all showed signs of sadistic tendencies on the killers’ part. Another link between the two serial killers is that Jack the Ripper showed signs of detailed anatomi cal knowledge, and it is postulated that he was medically trained. How ever, evidence suggests that Cream was in prison in Illinois at the time, making the connection tenuous at best. Did Cream bribe the officials to be released early, as Bell postu lates? Did he have a doppelganger that served time in his place? Or were Dr. Cream and Jack the Ripper friends who used each other’s pris on sentences as alibis? We will likely never know the truth...

Photo from mcgill.ca