CassiopeiaQuinn

Page Commentary No. 21

Added 2017-02-10 21:54:54 +0000 UTC

Gunwild: Some comments we've gotten on this are like "Why would they found a colony somewhere with unsafe levels of radiation?"

Psu: THAT'S A GOOD QUESTION GUNWILD

Gunwild: And that is a perfectly reasonable question, but I think it has a perfectly reasonable answer: they had to live somewhere.

Psu: A combination of law, borders, economics, have forced people to live in lots of unhappy places and space even though it's huge, the small smattering of "class M" planets makes things pretty difficult. I'm sure.

Gunwild: I mean, can you name a place on the face of the Earth that nobody's ever tried to live, no matter how uncomfortable?

Psu: It wasn't that the planet was impossible to live on, but that it was very difficult and trying. There were benefits too, as we discussed it probably had operational mines and useful resources. We'll get into it later when it happens in the comic, but it turned out building a colony on that specific planet was worth the investment. We didn't go into details on how old the colony is but likely it was built some time ago and whatever CEO managed it to begin with, probably just dropped support.

Gunwild: At least the colonists arrived well-equipped with cute, interesting designs!

Psu: Oh man, back in those days I still had a comic buffer so I could work on designs... I think though, you were very specific on having a "sexy widow" as she was referred to in the script for YEARS whenever she'd appear. These three, Sexy Widow, the kid, and the Mayor appear at least once as background characters in almost every chapter of the comic. The Sexy Widow and the Kid had some good design work going into them though Sexy Widow is maybe a little too much like Cassiopeia. (a problem that happens often for me.) But the Mayor was a bit of an on the fly design. I knew he'd be older and have a gaunt hairy face. But I just added the skull hat because I thought it was fun at the time.

Gunwild: I admit, I asked Matt from the Super Best Friends on YouTube if we could make someone look (and later talk) like him in our webcomic, and he said yes, so I'm a little disappointed that I don't know if he's ever seen it. Still, lots of good little things in here... I like how they are indeed all dressed ragtag, because they probably came here with barely more than the clothes on their backs and what they needed to build homes and start farming. Even the Sexy Widow has her hands wrapped, presumably for tilling or churning butter. And man, that overall robot. He's the best. Makes total sense, too: he doesn't want dirt and mud on his leg-joints!

Psu: I should mention I had fun with the design of the Omni scrubber too. It had to look like a piece of futuristic tech that was jimmied into some old farming equipment and I think it worked out well. I forget what the ideation process was, for the Omni Scrubber itself. We knew we wanted a piece of the ship that became vital to desperate people. A radiation scrubber seemed like something that would exist on a giant space cruiser AND help a small colony.

Gunwild: And, I will confess this, I stole "Live long and pasta!" from a bit of wall art at a now-closed pizza place I loved called Pie in the Sky in Stowe, VT. As I recall, it was right next to "I want a pizza the action. - Al Capone"

Psu: I didn't know you stole it. My illusions are shattered...

Gunwild: Hey, they closed! It was fair game!

Gunwild: Man, that place was great, they had a wood fire oven and fifty toppings you could choose from.

Psu: What good are fifty toppings when people always order the safe ones.

PAGE 2

(Panel 1: A dry, dusty world. It's not a complete desert; there are fields of food beginning to grow, but the trees are a bit gnarled and stunted, and if there’s a road visible it’s just a rough dirt track. It's a little Dust Bowl-ish around here. Maddy, Lieutenant Russ and Ison are all standing beside each other. Russ has his studiously neutral face on, Ison looks adorably surprised at what she's seeing, and Maddy’s sort of grim, but as always trying not to tip her hand. Perhaps their new ship is parked behind them somewhere? Anyway, they're the only ones in this panel, not the people they're meeting with, but they're clearly all looking at a party who is talking to them.)

TEXT BOX 1: DAY 14

TEXT BOX 2: Unnamed Colony, Planet EDR-0221

LYNX 1 (off-panel): Please, madam.

LYNX 2: (off-panel): We didn’t know anything was wrong when we got it.

(Panel 2: Now the reverse of the previous panel; the people the crewmembers are facing. Their leader is an old guy with a bit of a hunch to him. I imagine him wearing a bandana on his head kinda like Solomon Muto, to show that he’s working-class, but maybe with a bit of a shaggier wild-man beard, like Lynx-O from Thundercats. Actually, that’s what I’m gonna call him. Lynx! Lynxes are cool. Lynx is backed by the settlers of this colony. They’re a mix of humans and part-Xerrans, young and old alike, including a baby, all dressed in utilitarian farmer’s clothes; overalls, boots, trucker caps, feedsack dresses like from the depression, and one tomboyish teen blue girl in a hand-me-down sports jersey for the Jupiter Thunder. They are looking at the crew with a mixture of expressions, but mostly fear and concern that they’re gonna lose something they need. In fact, the tomboyish girl looks downright angry. But Lynx himself is just leaning on his cane, which is hand-carved wood, yet topped with a metal handle clearly scavenged from some kind of futuristic tool that probably outlived its usefulness. He almost looks actually sorry that they’ve got something from her stolen ship – clearly he’s old enough and has seen enough that he just wants to live and let live. Isn’t there enough pain in the galaxy? Answer: yes. In total, these people are in front of the mixture of premade modular and self-built thatch huts that they call homes. They’re really making the best go of it they can, and just starting to grab onto their first successes.)

LYNX 1: We weren’t even sure it would work, honestly.

LYNX 2: Thought it might be a scam, because the woman asked for so little in return.

LYNX 3: All she wanted was for us to have a party in her honor, and then wash her ship.

(Panel 3: An attractive woman, I would guess widowed before her time, wears a particularly low-cut dress with a bit of Old West frilliness to it. She looks a little blushy while she talks about meeting Zeke. I get the feeling that a handsome cowbot might be right up her alley. I kind of thought she might have some cute freckles like one of InCase’s girls to emphasize that while not a teenager anymore, she’s fairly young and playful, and there’s no harm in her. I dunno, that’s what freckles say to me sometimes... anyway, the tomboysh Xerran girl is next to her. In my mind, they’re friends. The tomboyish girl might be looking sidelong at her with an eyebrow raised, like the tone of her voice suggests that her idea of ‘polishing’ would be very thorough.)

SEXY WIDOW 1: I offered to polish her robot friend too, but he said it’d make him ‘uncomfortable.’

SEXY WIDOW 2: Unlucky me…

(Panel 4: Getting out in front of her friend, who’s thoroughly sidetracked herself, the tomboyish blue girl is a little more self-righteous towards Maddy. In the background, though, the attractive widow’s kind of hugging herself or holding her head in her hands, devolving completely into a fantasy of her own that is perhaps attracting still more gazes. Sexy widow needs a name for when these colonists inevitably have a future cameo, don't you think? You also mentioned that a Fullmetal Alchemist style chibification might work somewhere on this page, which I am fine with.)

SEXY WIDOW 1 (small text): Just wanted to shine up those broad shoulders…

TOMBOY 1: Look, lady, we NEED that omni-scrubber.

(Panel 5: Show the omni-scrubber, a big oval-shaped high-tech device that was formerly inside of the starship, and still has most of its casing on so that it’s fairly sleek. It is, however, stuck right into the ground with a bunch of power cables running out of it in multiple directions. Plants are already growing up around it, and Cassiopeia’s put some of her trademark graffiti on the side – perhaps herself with a chef hat on giving a peace sign and the scrawled words ‘EAT UP! ❤CASSIOPEIA’ on it. Or as a farmer. Chibi farmer Cassiopeia doodle?)