Today’s installment: a bit more flashback, starring Nostromo Kabong and Unnamed Softwear Pirate #3!
Especially since this arc of the story exists almost entirely in the tunnels, I’ve realized I’ve got a real challenge to demonstrate the World Outside The Wall without actually showing it. Flashbacks will work some, so I’ve got that going… and I have a few other tricks planned to help show what life is like up there. This isn’t any small detail, given how that whole world up there has been the motivation for everything Kain is doing “down here”. He’s not like Dwoight, he hasn’t signed on for adventuring; he’s trying to get home, because the world is showing him how little skills he has to survive. Seeing that damn wall (even in the background) every few pages served as a reminder to us where Kain is, and a reminder to Kain where he ISN’T.
(Side note: I keep thinking about a line I once heard about Canadians — maybe a throwaway line from a comedian, or a well-regarded consensus opinion — that they’re less defined by what they *are*, and more defined by what they *aren’t* (Americans, for example). That would sum up Kain for now.)
(Another side note: I’ve been watching “Dollhouse” this season, but not caring too much for it… much as I may want to, given how I’ve greatly enjoyed every other Joss Whedon story. My curiosity, however, also extends to the challenges of telling stories about a whole cast of “blank slate idiots” (my term). Since everyone in the World Outside The Wall ostensibly is missing some if not all of the memories from their lives before, how do you develop characters like that, and how sympathetic is the audience? I realize the great differences between that story and the one I want to tell, but still, it’s fun to think about, if you’re me.)
Color has been fun to bring in to the story (even though I’m trying to not go crazy with it), and no more so than giving color to scenes we’ve already seen in previous issues. Makes me want to go back and color those first four issues, if it wouldn’t be such a big undertaking. If you compare SK1-4 and the SK5 story online, you’ll see how much I’ve shifted the new art to outline only: that’s both a nod to my animation roots and an end run around my inept inking talents. Well, that old stuff is so NOT drawn to be colored, I’d have to spend a lot more time just cutting mattes for areas to color… and, if you haven’t already got the idea, I’d really rather keep the story moving forward.
See you in five days.
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