Editing 2145: Heists And Escapes

{{comic
| number    = 2145
| date      = May 3, 2019
| title     = Heists And Escapes
| image     = heists_and_escapes.png
| titletext = The interactive experience is built on a single theological framework that unites Dante, George R. R. Martin, every major heist movie, and Erin Gloria Ryan's "Kevin is dead" Home Alone theory.
}}

==Explanation==
The top six panels show a stylized version of various options where people try to get into or out of rooms. There are always two xkcd figures trying to get into or out of a room. One is always rattling, possibly at a locked door. While no door is drawn, the position of their hands indicates this. The second figure always has their hands at head height, possibly looking for weaknesses in the structure. The characters in each panel vary and there seems to be no specific pattern to them.

The six top panels show these scenarios:

* {{w|Escape Room|Escape Rooms}}: An escape room is a type of puzzle/adventure game where people are locked in a room, or set of rooms, (discounting emergency exits) and have a certain amount of time to solve the puzzles and leave.
* {{w|Heist film|Heist movies}}: In heist movies, the thieves are trying to get in to a room, usually to steal what's inside.
* ''{{w|Home Alone}}'' (1990): This refers to the first movie in a franchise, where the home that the burglars tried to rob was protected by someone from the inside, Kevin McCallister (also mentioned in the title text).
* The Battle of Winterfell: This refers to the {{w|The Long Night (Game of Thrones episode)|3rd episode}} of the 8th season of ''{{w|Game of Thrones}}'', aired five days before the publication of this comic. Here the army of the dead tried to enter the castle of Winterfell (the outer room in the picture). At the same time the dead who are in the crypt (the inner room in the picture) tried to get out. The living people in the castle were trapped between them.
* ''{{w|Inception}}'' (2010): In the movie ''Inception'' the protagonists could enter the dream world of others, and while in those dreams they could enter the dreams of someone inside the dream. ''Inception'' can be categorized as a "heist" movie, as the main characters are thieves who steal information from their victim's subconscious or plant ideas into it.
* ''{{w|Divine Comedy|The Divine Comedy}}'' (1320): This refers to {{w|Dante Alighieri|Dante}}'s work - in particular its first part ''{{w|Inferno (Dante)|Inferno}}'', which depicts Hell as nine concentric circles. {{w|Purgatorio|Purgatory}} and {{w|Paradiso (Dante)|paradise}} are similarly concentric, but they are not likely to need to be escaped. Humor is provided by the style of the work's description, likening The Divine Comedy to a movie, though there were no movies in 1320{{Citation needed}}.

At the end, Randall proposes a combination of all of these things, and also combining it with others, to form the "greatest escape room game of all time":

The escape room begins in a small room, shown with Cueball and Megan standing inside, who likely represent the participants of the escape room. An arrow leads out from that room into a larger bank, where some more characters labeled The Dead, referencing The Battle of Winterfell, are standing. An arrow leaves from them that merges into Cueball and Megan’s, implying they join them as they escape the room.

The arrows continue outside the bank, into a larger room labeled ''{{w|The Truman Show|Truman Show}}'', inspired by the film where the protagonist was living in a constructed reality show, although he did not know it. The path branches upwards around or into Kevin McCallister’s house, with the arrows inside spitting yet again, either exiting the house again or entering Kevin McCallister’s subconscious, a reference to the movie ''Inception''. The arrows once again split and continue either downwards or to the right, both exiting McCallister’s house.

The path to the right splits, the top path crossing {{w|Styx}}, a river in Greek mythology that forms the boundary between Earth and the Underworld, represented by Dante’s Inferno, taken from ''The Divine Comedy'', and the other returning to the line that leads downwards. The line that leads to Dante’s Inferno is met by the line that leads around Kevin McCallister’s house. It can be assumed that this is not a breaking into the underworld as portrayed in some movies, but due to the simplicity of the paths (note that unlike for the escape the line just crosses Styx) it is the possibility of failing prior puzzles and dying. In that case the escape room puzzle would continue with escaping from the underworld to rejoin the puzzles.

Both paths lead downwards back across Styx, rejoining the other lines below McCallister’s house. The lines continue to the bank and spit to either re-enter the bank or exit the escape room entirely. The line that re-enters the bank either returns to The Dead or into the bank’s vault, which the line also exits the escape room.

The title text refers to [https://www.thedailybeast.com/home-alone-is-so-much-better-if-kevin-mccallister-is-dead this article], which claims that Kevin McCallister is dead, and is actually a ghost.

==Transcript==
:[Seven different room scenarios are shown with characters attempting to get inside or outside, each with a label below them.]

:[Cueball and Ponytail trying to exit a room.]
:Escape rooms

:[Cueball and Megan trying to enter a room.]
:Heist movies

:[A small version of Cueball stands in the middle of a room while a Hairy on the left and Cueball on the right are trying to enter.]
:''Home Alone'' (1990)

:[A room is shown inside a larger room. Two characters try to enter from outside and two others try to exit from the inner room while Megan and Cueball are standing between them.]
:The Battle of Winterfell

:[Four rooms are shown inside of each other. Two characters try to enter from outside while three Cueballs in each room are standing while asleep.]
:''Inception'' (2010)

:[Smaller rooms are recursively shown inside of larger ones, with two characters trying to escape from each.]
:''The Divine Comedy'' (1320)

:[At the bottom a more complicated combination of various rooms shown in gray, with arrows labeled with question marks showing escape routes for two characters in black. On the left is a large room labelled Truman Show, and on the right is the nine-level Dante's Inferno. Between them is the river Styx. Inside the Truman Show are the Bank, which contains a Room with the two people in it, a Vault with a money bag in it, and The Dead; and Kevin McCallister's House and Subconscious.]

:[Label in the bottom in black:]
:My plan for the greatest escape room game of all time

==Trivia==
Judging by the depicted scene, the Battle of Winterfell referenced in the comic seems to refer to the battle taking place in the 3rd episode of the 8th season of the TV show Game of Thrones. While there is no official naming of all battles in the show, this is in line with the naming on most blogs and other discussions published around the premiere of that episode. However several wikis and other more long term reviews of the show refer to this battle as the "Battle of Ice and Fire". On these sites the "Battle of Winterfell" refers to the battle in the 10th episode of the 5th season between Stannis Baratheon and the Boltons.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Hairy]]
[[Category:Multiple Cueballs]]
[[Category:Game of Thrones]]