Page Commentary No. 32

Gunwild: Talps is pretty on the ball with human language already. That's why she knows when to use "Aye!" when honestly, a lot of humans get it wrong.

Psu: I don't even know what the right usage of Aye is.

Gunwild: You answer "yes" to a question and "aye" to an order. Like if I said "Are you ready to draw a really good webcomic?!" you'd say "Yes!" But if I said "Go draw a really good webcomic!" You'd say "Aye!"

Gunwild: I mean all this preumes we move production to a boat.

Psu: Your knowledge of boating has greatly influenced the direction of our wacky space faring and thieving adventures comic.

Psu: I quite like the colors on this page a lot. It's a lot less extreme than the last few pages, owing a lot to the blackness of space. But the way Moc stands out with his big bright orange head in the first few panels, then giving way to the big yellow screen panel in the middle is particularly nice. I'd say this is a really nice combination of colors that compliments all the actors on there. I think it's also when I had completely dropped the brush work from the previous half dozen pages.

Gunwild: Cassiopeia would have a continuing habit of making up songs, if I were more able to write them.

Psu: I rather like this one. I wish I had a smarter way to show that someone is singing than adding a few musical notes to the sides of dialog boxes but I suppose the comic doesn't really call for it a lot. But it definitely adds a lot of character to this scene and how Cassiopeia "works." The singing is pretty much the perfect way to infuriate Maddy. I think one of the nice things about this page was that we had a clear sense of what emotions we wanted to run Maddy through on the page. Knowing that helped us get a big upset face, lit from below by the monitor, making for a very strong panel.

Gunwild: One more charm point to make note of: the Vanaa anti-virus software has a mascot that's a plunger-holding viking warrior type. That's something we'd bring back in "The Smooshsonian Institute" and I continue to love it even though it was put here as a kind of accidental joke. I mean, we just meant to make him a cleaner at first, but then we were like, "Hm, bladed weapons aren't that useful on fellow Vanaa, maybe that's a dangerous weapon..."

Psu: I'm not really sure how a plunger is a dangerous weapon to a vanaa! Maybe it was used to suck enemies from out of their protective armors!

Gunwild: Immobilizing, too! It's hard to pull a suction cup off of yourself, imagine how much worse it would be if you were goo-latinous?

Psu: I think the bucket though, is just a bucket. But it would be handy for CARRYING THE REMAINS OF YOUR FALLEN FOES.

Gunwild: Or it's tummy armor.

Psu: There's a lot of good story telling on this page that I admit, I don't think we see as much in some of the later comics. A lot of this stemmed from knowing well in advance that we were coming up to this page. So we knew the things we had to design and plan for. The "security camera" shot from inside the shuttle had to fit the top of the ship design earlier AND would show us the set that Cassiopeia would be in for the next dozen pages. I managed to sneak in Zeke dealing with some large canisters for some as yet unrevealed reason. And it set our protagonists in a dramatic "face off." I love it.

Psu: I also love Moc's little antenna. It's probably my favorite Vanaa accessory.

Gunwild: I prefer Gleb's iridescent shell collar. But then, I'm highbrow.