UPDATING OCCASIONALLY (FOR NOW)

9 thoughts on “558 – Cotton Clad Calamity”

  1. Raznaak

    Yup, he’s a bastard XD

  2. Dr. Norman (not a real doctor)

    Are those pajamas available in XXXL in the gift shop?

  3. Otaku

    It’s been a while, so let me ask: Did we get a reason for him to WANT Susie dead? Not to backseat, but if we didn’t, I’m worried were about to move into “Stupid Evil” territory. Now, stupid happens, don’t get me wrong. It’s not bad storytelling for that to be the case here.

    You’ve just done a good job NOT having that be a driving factor, so the “Kill off the stars of my successful reality TV show.” seems shortsighted, otherwise. Oh, I guess I could be mistaken about the in-story reality TV show’s success. Like, if the company behind them is losing money, or they think a change in management at the ranch would make the whole thing more popular/profitable, then I can see the above scenario happening as well.

    I REALLY think I’m just forgetting something important, but that I don’t have time to deep dive to remind me of, hence the comment. >_<

    1. Deoxy

      It certainly has been stretched out over quite a while, but there have definitely been hints from quite near the beginning that whoever is running the reality TV show definitely wants her dead.

      But I certainly don’t recall any reason why.

      1. Clint

        Yeah it’s fair to not remember since it’s been a hot minute (many, many minutes) but if you feel like a refresher the most relevant bits would be the beginning of Episode 8 and the end of Episode 15. We haven’t explicitly spelled out exactly what The Exec means by his “side hustle” or who was on the other end of that phone call, though.

        I’m hoping that when the whole thing is eventually available it will make sense, or at least enough sense to have hung this narrative on.

        1. Otaku

          Thanks for the replies, Deoxy and Clint. Yeah, I’d totally forgotten about those things. Good to know!

  4. Evervigilant

    Seems about time for the two people who aren’t there to make a surprise entrance as the ace Susie didn’t even know she had.

  5. Scarsdale

    There’s still 3-5 people on her side that might be planning something. This guy is a megalomaniac with a god complex, so letting him think he’s the sharpest tool in the shed sets him up for a fall. Everything depends on those cameras, and I suspect their little stop over by the charging coffins had something to do with her actual plan, not the one the a-hole thinks it is.

  6. lyra

    Really enjoyed the opening of Zombie Ranch. I like the combination of the western setting with the zombie concept, it gives the story a really distinctive atmosphere. I’m a freelance illustrator and animator, and I’d be interested in seeing how some of these scenes could translate into motion, especially as a short animated teaser or character scene.

    If you’re ever interested in something like that, you can reach me here:

    IG: eve_verse_
    Email: [contact.lilaclines@gmail.com](mailto:contact.lilaclines@gmail.com)
    Discord: Lyralilac_

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558 – Cotton Clad Calamity
Posted on August 26, 2026 by Dawn

What would you call this? Armchair assassination? Merk-from-home?

Well, Suzie ain't dead (or undead) quite yet, so we'll just have to see if his gloating is justifiable.

Ascended extras

Posted on December 2, 2015 by Clint

I should some day check back through these blogs and see what my record is for writing entries without referencing the TV Tropes site. In any case, reset the count because today I have the Ascended Extra on my mind.

Now in purest terms, an Ascended Extra is one of the people in the background of a production. A “face in the crowd” that somehow for whatever reason ends up standing out from the crowd and coming to the forefront of the story. Examples would be Miles O’Brien, who didn’t even have a name when he first started appearing in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Felicity Smoak in Arrow was originally supposed to be a one-scene wonder just there for some hackety-hacking skills, and yet now she’s arguably the female lead. Frasier Crane was a background character in Cheers that became a regular and then the headliner of his own series.

The common thread is that these ascensions are unplanned, but due to the actor’s charisma or thematic necessities or what have you, they resonate enough with the showrunners and/or audience that forthcoming scripts are altered to bring them into the fold, and sometimes even the forefront.

What does this have to do with Zombie Ranch? Well, it’s not so much a cast member, it’s more that we literally have an Extras section in our archives where we dump all our filler comics after times that we’ve been on vacation or otherwise needed a break from the main story. Those filler comics are segregated because they’re not really meant as any sort of actual canon to the setting — but sometimes, the ideas in them keep harassing me.

Such it was with the idea of Grunt and Groan, which basically was Dawn saying, “I want to do a movie poster with a caveman and a zombie” and me shrugging and going, “Okay.” She was excited with the idea, which was good since one of our guest artists had unexpectedly canceled on us. Anyhow, the end result turned out to be so entertaining that when she wanted to revisit the idea with another bit of filler a few months later I agreed to help write dialogue for it.

I don’t remember at what point I decided Grunt and Groan would be an actual in-universe franchise, but it certainly fit with the sometimes ridiculous nature of the media saturated world we’d been portraying beyond the confines of the Z Ranch. Mars Adventure was but the tip of Gruntberg. I suppose I made that decision at least by the time we slapped it into the background on Uncle Chuck’s wall in Episode 9, but I feel this week’s comic truly confirms the ascension of Grunt and Groan beyond the filler comic ghetto and into main continuity.

I only wish I could have worked in the line about Groan being “twenty years past retirement.” Stupid zombie.