Sorry, Muriel, didn’t quite catch that… what were you gonna do?

Besides be a large and tasty speed bump, that is.

That’s a whole other story, but I want to get back to the fact that I first ran across those X-men comics in my big sister’s room. I don’t know if she was still interested much in them at that point, but they represented prima facie evidence that in some earlier time they had held her interest enough for her to brave our dusty, dark local comic book store and buy several issues over a course of several months.

But you know, why not? The X-books, by and large, still have a reputation for being “female friendly”, and what Claremont was doing around the late 70s/early 80s is probably largely responsible for establishing that. That age of comics was where heroes were getting more complicated than just punching the bad guys, and Storm and Jean Grey/Phoenix benefited from that just as much as their male counterparts. Sure it might have just been the two of them on the team as regulars, but as soon as you have even two ladies present, you stop being able to just define them as “the girl”.  I guess there still could have been “the white girl” and “the black girl”, but Claremont was pretty good about giving them a lot more distinctions to chew over.

A little over a year ago I made an entire post on the subject of superficiality in characters, of the danger of those that deviate from the “norm” being seen as symbols rather than people, becoming defined by their deviance rather than any other facet of their being. Unless you as a writer can overcome this human tendency to compartmentalize based on surface impressions, you risk your heroes ending up feeling somehow more shallow, like the way a happy face might represent a person smiling, but an actual photorealistic portrait of a person smiling has so much more for a viewer to contemplate. Without any perceivable depth to the presentation, the spectre of tokenism raises its stereotypical head.

In the course of that argument with myself, I came up with the idea that the easiest way to solve the problem was plurality. Like in the example above, if there’s two women on the X-team, the viewer’s mind will start to search for other differences besides just boobs/no boobs. Would they stop at the skin color? Maybe, but at least you’re already getting some analytical momentum going, right? The brain has now engaged in the same mode as it would when looking between the male characters and being curious about what makes this one different than that one. The next step as an author is the same as you would do with those men… give them distinct dialogue, give them things to react to in different ways, show the things that make them interesting so that the reader, in turn, gets interested. This gal’s tough, but her hot temper can get her in trouble. This gal’s honorable to a fault. Et cetera, et cetera.

Mind you, all this further development can only happen if the ladies in question get some time in the spotlight. That’s true of any characters, truthfully, but in mainstream comics it can still be rare to see the women on a team get some quality time. That’s why this month, I’m looking with piqued interest at the X-Men again for the first time in a long time. Why? Because X-Men may actually be a misnomer in this case. Call it an experiment in plurality:

http://www.wired.com/underwire/2013/01/x-men-relaunches-as-all-female-superhero-team/

I’ll be interested to see how this turns out. A lot of the women on the roster have already benefited in the past from the X-books not being shy about focusing on them from time to time, but now we’re also looking at an entire team dynamic filled out without any of the usual (male) suspects involved. It leaves Rogue unquestionably in the “big muscle” role, Psylocke (with pants!) probably acting as the hard edged loner… and any Marvel brat of the 80s knows that “Storm With Mohawk = Leader”. But no matter which character of this team the spotlight focuses on from issue to issue, it’ll be a woman.

X-Men #1 should supposedly be out by the end of May. The plurality is there. It just remains to be seen what writer Brian Wood can do with it.

Guess Muriel assumed Rosa had that T.H.K. all set up to go. Which is possibly the kind of assumption you’d only make if you’d been kicked in the head, but Suzie sure ain’t splittin’ hairs when there’s a nice fat lip to split instead.

The 4th Annual Long Beach Comic Expo will be rolling into the Long Beach Convention Center this Saturday, 10am-6pm! The Expo has a bit of a strange set-up where some of the exhibitors will be out in the lobby area while others are inside the ballroom… we will be one of the “insiders”, so if you’re attending be sure to look for us at table #4000, along what I believe would be the south wall. The floor space is fairly tiny so as long as you remember the lobby/ballroom set-up and keep an eye out for our banners you shouldn’t get too lost, but if you snag a map look for “Clint Wolf” or “Dawn Wolf” as your reference.

The important thing to me here, this week, was how it plays into a certain protagonist finally getting the opportunity to punch the hell out of someone who richly, richly deserved it.

Zombie Ranch is a story where for the most part, I haven’t had the characters do too much that might be considered, for lack of a better term, “badass”. They’re not superheroes. In fact, keeping with the theme of reality television, I like to think of them just plain folks. Plain folks doing a dangerous job. I tend to write them that way, too, because it makes them real to me… and, hopefully, that carries through to the readership.

The thing is, though, that no fiction will be absolutely true-to-life, at least not any fiction I would find conceivably enjoyable. This opinion piece has an interesting discussion on realism as applied to superhero comics, which includes the following quote: “…when fans talk about wanting more “realism” in their superhero stories, I don’t think that’s what they mean. I think they want verisimilitude. Which is a ten-dollar word that translates to, more or less, “fake realism that I can sort of believe in even though I know it’s silly.” ”

Now that’s definitely a “more or less” translation, but I understand what the author’s getting at, and it applies to more than just superheroes but all manner of drama. Every time some CSI perp is identified based on their “enhanced” reflection in a crappy photograph, every time the commanders of great armies suddenly find themselves face to face on the battlefield where they can engage in single combat, every time characters trade perfectly formed, zingy one-liners over the blades of their crossed swords or the trays of their afternoon tea… none of these things are very realistic, are they? But they sure are entertaining. No matter how grounded and realistic the setting, we crave a certain amount of departure. We want those acceptable breaks from reality, or why bother with fiction at all?

Even where the vaunted “reality television” is concerned, by the time it reaches an audience there’s a soundtrack added, visual effects, and tons and tons of editing to make sure you only see enough of the boring moments of working a crab boat long enough to remind you there are boring moments. But Zombie Ranch mostly represents the raw footage, right?

Well, it’s also a story. Mind you, it’s a story I paced with a deliberate slowness to the point where at least one review accused that in the entire first issue/episode, “nothing happens”, but there’s still plenty of stuff that comes with a bit of dramatic license attached, whether for the sake of humor or just presenting something cool.

Most of the time I’m pretty low-key about it, and Dawn’s art follows suit. You probably won’t ever see someone in this comic wielding chainsaw nunchucks, awesome as that is. It ain’t that kind of setting. But that doesn’t mean I can’t try to provide the occasional cathartic, heroic moment of… well, verisimilitude, of the kind Suzie has just busted out.

Some people even contend such moments are good for character development, but regardless of that they sure are damn good fun to read.

And write.

Well, now we know what happened to the Z Tracker after Rosa tossed it. If her shotgun hadn’t run dry, Muriel might have killed Suzie and been done with matters. Maybe. Instead, her revenge has come down to the T.H.K., the last resort of a last resort… which to be honest, Suzie might consider a worse fate than death.

Time to settle up in civilized fashion… and we don’t mean Miss Langhorne babbling about clothes.

Saturday is Free Comic Book Day!

If you’ve never been to one, it’s a pretty sweet deal assuming you can deal with the crowds. There are usually crowds, not just because of being able to pick from a usually quite decent selection of print issues from the big publishers (and some smaller ones), but because famous creators are often also invited to do in-store signings.

Well, your mileage may vary as to our fame, but we’ve received our first ever invitation to be part of the hubbub! So this May 4th you’ll be able to find us manning our very own creator table at Player’s Dugout Comic & Cards from 10am-6pm. If you can’t see their Facebook page, the address is:

9428 Magnolia Avenue, Riverside, CA 92503

Come on out and say howdy if you have the notion!

But yeah, regardless of intent I sure feel like I’ve hit the readership with a lot of cliff hangers lately, particularly compared to the early episodes. Not every page has ended with someone figuratively dangling by their fingernails, so I dare to dream that I’m not running fans to emotional exhaustion… but these last few weeks have been pretty intense.

In my defense, we’ve come to the climactic moments of this whole first story arc, so dangit, it’s high time for some focused intensity. Also in my defense, most of the readership likely isn’t nearly as invested as the vocal (and much appreciated!) few that are piping up every week to urge Suzie onwards and shake their fists in Muriel’s direction. I know at least one person who’s commented that they can’t ever really get concerned about a main protagonist because of the phenomenon of “plot armor” (mind you, if they ever read any of the books Game of Thrones is based on they’re in for a shock or ten). Others are reading over a dozen webcomics and taking classes/working jobs and just mosey by every month or so to see if “whats-her-name” finally got the drop on “whos-her-face”.

I don’t honestly know how many fans we’ve corralled that could be termed “hardcore”, in that they really (cliff) hang on our every update. I would be hesitant to declare that even one such exists, except just a few days ago Dawn got a comment on her DeviantArt page from a reader who claimed “yours is the only webcomic I follow religiously and bother to learn the posting schedule of. It has a lot of my favorite things.”

Just knowing even one such is out there is a heady feeling. Successfully getting people embroiled in your story and characters, especially to that level? Hell yeah. And yet ironically, those people are the most likely to suffer at those points of your story where you put your characters in harm’s way. I think most dramatic fiction gets its hooks in us regardless of people being aware of the plot armor phenomenon… the James Bond 007 movies are continuing proof of that. And Doctor Who has that whole bit where even if he dies he’ll come back, but that doesn’t stop people from being on the edge of their seats in regards to his adventures.

Mind you if a story was dependent on nothing more than cliff hangers I would probably find it boring rather quickly, which is why it’s important that people are interested in what James Bond is up to even when he’s not chained into the latest death trap. And then when he’s in the death trap, you desperately want him to get out of it so he can continue doing all those other cool things, and also kick the butt of that smug villain who put him there.

So, at least in some of your cases I think I’ve gotten to that point with Suzie, and because of that I do apologize for any emotional trauma all these recent cliff hangers may be provoking. Just remember, if and when she does make it through, you’ll also be the ones most primed to stand up and cheer.

Stupid low-ammo shotguns, eh Muriel? Got her this far, but she’s not having much luck finishing the fight. Then again, neither are the people trying to stop her, and her presence unfortunately seems to have rallied some of her kin despite the threat of armed retaliation.

One thing’s for sure, it doesn’t seem like anyone’s caring about the cameras anymore… even if “just shoot her” is so far proving more complicated a solution than either side figured.

(And yes, the title for this week was changed in honor of the TV Trope brought up in last week’s commentary, although the events of the page were planned out awhile back. Funny how these things work out…)

Now first, oddly enough, when I went to good ol’ TV Tropes to try to find the entry governing such matters, I couldn’t locate one. If it’s common enough for some to consider it tired out, you’d think it would have the good grace to be easier to find!

That is, by the way, free license for any of you reading this to roam forth and succeed where I failed… I didn’t look too hard. But even if it really isn’t there right now, I’d be the first to argue it’s perfectly worthy of a YKTTW attempt. YKTTW stands for “You Know, That Thing Where…” and is basically the way tropes get put forward as possible additions to the site, where they can be refined for consumption, or (as happens more often than not) outed as already being present on TV Tropes in some form. It means some patience and effort on the part of the sponsor, but it’s a fairly decent editorial process. I ran the gauntlet myself awhiles back when I put together an entry on people in fiction being able to hear each other perfectly no matter the circumstances, which I cunningly(?) termed Acoustic License.

I digress, however. Villain rises again for a last shot at the hero, sometimes in what is felt to be a far-fetched fashion. My gut tells me that yes, this is a Thing. As for my use of it? Well, from my perspective I didn’t find it out of the blue, since everything I’d shown (or more importantly, not shown) since the last time we saw Muriel left the question of her survival open. I myself know exactly what happened in that smoke cloud at the end of Episode 6, and what she did after, and even though the audience may never see it, that was enough for me to move forward with the narrative as planned.

And from a writing perspective, that’s just something you sometimes have to do. Sure, you can seek feedback from all manner of different folk and look at all manner of different approaches others have used for similar subject matter, but in the end the decision and the burden rests on you. And you’ll have to face the fact that not everyone will be happy with the direction you go.

This isn’t the first time a reader has questioned an aspect of the story or the behavior of a character, and it won’t be the last. It’s not the first time a trope has been invoked, and it won’t be the last. If you read no other article on TV Tropes as an aspiring writer, you should read the one I linked last week, but shall link again here: Tropes Are Tools. Hell, I recommend it for everyone. If you don’t want to take the time, the basic principles are that Tropes Are Not Bad, and Tropes Are Not Good… and no work of fiction can exist without them.

As with all tools, skill and experience play a role in the product created… but there’s also always a subjectivity involved in the creative arts. As far as comics go, for instance, there are many, many people who regard both Watchmen and Batman: Arkham Asylum as masterworks. And yet Grant Morrison was on record as considering Watchmen “the 300-page equivalent of a 6th form poem” (in U.S. terms, basically saying it was a college freshman effort at best), and Alan Moore in turn described Arkham Asylum as “a gilded turd”.

Truly, one man’s trash can be another man’s masterpiece, eh?

This doesn’t invalidate criticism, but it’s something to keep in mind. Mark Evanier, who I’ve mentioned before, is fond of saying that there are two truisms involved in any piece of creative work that achieves popularity: someone will declare it the worst piece of crap that’s ever crossed their radar, and someone else will be so impressed they’ll steal it and try to pass it off as their own.

For the record, I’m not considering Zombie Ranch a masterwork, or even all that popular. I work with my tools, and I do the best I can in the manner in which I feel best serves the story we want to tell. I’m sure there are plenty of people who have been disappointed along the course of that, whether or not they chose to express their disappointment vocally (well, as “vocal” as you technically can be in written forms). Even those of you who have stuck around probably have your own hopes and dreams of “What happens next?”, which may not jibe with what I have cooking. Every new comic comes fraught with the peril to underwhelm at least a portion of the audience… but if I spent my time worrying about that, I could never get the story told at all. Tropes are tools, and a writer should be aware of them, and perhaps even a little afraid of them, the way one would be cautious handling any potentially dangerous substance… but never to the point of trying to avoid them. That’s just troping against trope, and while I suppose that is also a Thing, it’s not a particularly productive one.

No one thought Muriel was going away that easy, did they? Well, Frank had his hopes. Suzie, too, but she had a runaway herd to deal with first and foremost.

Popcorn left his mark when he and Muriel tangled, but looks like it wasn’t enough to keep the ol’ mama bear down. And now she’s returned the favor, just when Suzie thought safety from the incoming zed stampede was a single leap away.

At the risk of being cliché: things don’t look good for our hero.

Sounds impressive, unless of course you’re dealing with an industry professional who asks, “What the hell is the Golden Shuzbut Award?”, and even more embarrassingly may follow this with the further question, “Why should I care?”. How does the fact you won this Golden Shuzbut have any more bearing on your credentials as a creative artist than that mug you received for Christmas last year with “World’s Greatest Nephew!” ?

Well, if you were the World’s Greatest Nephew of Steven Spielberg, that might be something, but let’s stay away from nepotism for the time being. The point is that even if you win the contest you paid to enter, the end result might well be no more impressive to the world at large than if you’d just taken your money to an engraver and had a nice plaque made with your name and “#1 Artist!”

The question of whether or not a contest is worth being part of is such a big one that the Writer Beware site of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America has an entire section devoted to helping aspiring writers make the judgment call. Just having an entry fee doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not worth the time, but there are other pitfalls to consider as well.

For instance, winning can have far worse consequences than just receiving a consensually insignificant award. Much, much worse.

You might win a contract.

Well, wait… how is that bad? Isn’t the whole point to garner some fame, recognition, and (hopefully) money? A guaranteed contract with people who will promote you and your ideas to the world sounds like the perfect reward!

This is where it gets sticky, though. What are the terms of this contract? And does participating in the contest mean you have no right of refusal should you win? That’s a big red flag to look out for, because you could be locked in legally just by signing up, and you may not like the end result.

In general, I think independent artists nowadays understand that copyright is an important thing and not to be given up lightly. But just recently a fellow webcomicker brought to my attention a contract award where the organizers made a big deal of the artist retaining their copyright… but their company will control exclusive commercial distribution rights, in all forms, for the next eight years. The artist will enjoy 20% of the net profits of those enterprises.

Which still might sound pretty tempting to a person struggling to pay their rent, right? The problem is you might be giving up a lot for very little. “Net profits”, for example, are not the same as “gross profits”, and there is a very clear illustration of why they are risky to have in your contract at this link. One of the highest grossing movies in history, Return of the Jedi, is making some people very rich and leaving others very poor, and the reason why is right there in the term “highest grossing”. Due to Hollywood accounting shenanigans, it’s still considered unprofitable, which in this case is to say that it made no net profit once the ahem, “operating expenses” were tallied.

That’s pretty sobering to consider, but hey, at least Peter Mayhew has some fame and still gets to be a special guest at conventions, right? He was part of something really special and has fans all over the world, even if he never got rich off of it.

Well, consider this. In the case above, they are paying you exactly zilch for the potential to profit off of your idea. In fact, I believe you do have to pay to enter the contest, but even if you didn’t, the key term here is “potential”. What happens if they just decide to sit on it and do nothing? Was there any clause requiring them to actually do something with the property? Sure, people get paid by film companies wanting to option the rights to their ideas all the time, and a lot of times those companies don’t end up doing anything with it. I have one friend whose graphic novel has been optioned not just once, but twice by different film companies, the second picking it up after the first sat on it for too long and the rights expired.

Is he angry that he never got to see his ideas make it to the silver screen? Nope. If the second company doesn’t do anything for long enough, the rights expire again, and every time another company comes to him with an option deal, he gets paid thousands of dollars again. You’ll notice there’s two important factors at work here, though, which is that he’s getting paid up front, and the terms of expiration aren’t eight years, but the standard 12-18 months the film industry works with.

Also, hell, the whole legal structure of “optioning” is different. Optioning is not so much buying the rights as buying a window of time where they have the exclusive right to cut a further deal, assuming they can put a production together. If they can’t, that’s their fault and they gave you thousands of dollars for nothing. Too bad for them, but great for you, especially if another suitor comes knocking.

Now I admit I haven’t gone over the contest contract with a legal expert, but these organizers don’t sound like they’d be out thousands of dollars if they did jack crap with what you gave them. You might say it’s in their best interests to at least try, but how hard will they try? For how long? All eight of those years? Sure, you still own the copyright to your work, but how much does that matter if the only way you’re legally allowed to profit off it is through them, and any net profits (much less 20% of net profits) may never exist at all even if the IP proves very popular? I’m guessing since you still own the copyright you might be able to give your work away for free, but you better not have so much as one Project Wonderful ad on your website.

Commercial distribution in all forms is a pretty draconian clause, when you think about it. Are they really the best company possible to handle every potential licensing agreement for the next several years? Games, books, movies, comics, action figures, maybe even potential media that hasn’t even surfaced yet? Again, you at very least signed away your right to deal with movie companies yourself, now all that tasty option money is theirs and you don’t get a dime.

And even if they are completely sincere about making you and your work the next big thing, there’s the spectre of a company going bankrupt and being bought by someone else. Eight years is a long time, particularly where a new venture is concerned, and unless there are specific clauses in your contract, it does not expire because it changed hands, and the new owners may have even less interest in promoting you.

It’s possible with terms like this that you could still get lucky, but if you don’t, you might end up just as broke and unknown as you are now, and with the added burden that you no longer are the sole custodian of that wonderful idea you nurtured. Even promises of copyright retention aren’t enough to just nod and sign, and you had better be very aware of the terms & conditions you’re agreeing to just by entering, which might in some cases be as good as signing that contract in blood in the eyes of the courts.

If you win, of course. But sometimes, it does seem like winning can be far worse than losing.