1 {scene: Interior: A zeppelin gliding majestically over 1930s Paris} 1 Haken: Ah, Paris! I vas here last time durink World War I. 2 Ginny: "World War I"? Surely you mean The Great War. 3 Haken: Uhhh... Ja, ja. Ve haff no plans. Disregard die numbering.

The background is a royalty-free stock photo from morgueFile. I have not been to Paris myself. Yet.

I visited Paris for the first, and so far only, time in 2012.

Looking at the photo in the comic, and matching it up to one of my own photos from that trip (below), I believe I can say that the photo in the comic was taken from the top of Notre Dame Cathedral:

Note the similar position of the golden dome to the left of the Eiffel Tower. The dome marks the position of Les Invalides.

Well, obviously the background is from somewhere near the top of Notre Dame, since they wouldn't want to crash their zeppelin into the cathedral.

Interestingly enough (for those of us interested in such minutia), the phrase "the First World War" does appear in print well before the start of the Second World War, although it doesn't become popular or widespread until after WWII. But it would be possible for Haken to be simply well-read in these things. :)



For instance:



"It is interesting to note that in the end Repington, with remarkable foresight, chose for his book of 1920 the title The First World War (a name Churchill was also to use for the Seven Years' War), reminding us of the remarks D. H. Lawrence reportedly said whilst attending a party on Armistice Night:



'The war isn't over. The hate and evil is greater now than ever. Very soon war will break out again and overwhelm you... the Germans will soon rise again.' (quoted in S. Hynes, A War Imagined, 1992, pp. 566-67)."

Reader Veli-Matti writes: