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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.

Straying off-topic

Posted on April 9, 2014 by Clint

One of my favorite moments in Jaws has nothing to do with a giant shark attacking people. It’s a slow, quiet scene in a dining room between a police chief who’s had a really bad day, and his young son responding to his father’s brooding by imitating his oh-so serious countenance. Eventually the father notices and a bit of a game plays out, and by the end Chief Brody might not be entirely cheered up, but you can see him remembering and contemplating that there are still good things in the world.

There are no explosions. There is no blood. There is only the most tangential relation to the main storyline. Nothing earth-shattering is revealed about anyone… a father and son care about each other? The mother watching on is charmed by their antics? Big whoop. And yet Spielberg recognized that cutting it would have been a criminal act. It’s somehow magically both completely off-topic and yet completely crucial to the narrative.

I don’t claim to possess anything approaching that level of instinct, but somewhere along the line I composed a scene where Chuck tries to share his stash of old sweets with Rosa, and it felt right. A reader might well ask what the hell this has to do with zombie ranching, perhaps even going so far as to declare their time is being wasted with inconsequential padding. Well, maybe. Come to think of it, I may have gone over this exact same argument before, when I brought up the idea that not every Chekhov’s Gun has to fire.

That entry is getting on towards three years old, now, and oddly enough predates some of the “guns” that have gone off, such as the lawn flamingo playing a role in the Zane/McCarty confrontation, the Z Tracker, or the thought of the siege house moat being filled with zombies. Does that mean Chuck’s jar of honey will be playing a vital narrative role in the months to come? I’ll let you speculate if you want, but I wouldn’t think too hard on it. Right now it just stands as some more (hopefully entertaining) interaction between Chuck and Rosa, and I’m content to offer that up since I’m still of a mind to think it serves a purpose. It might seem off-topic, but Jaws made moments like these work, I think precisely because they possessed a certain organic feel that gets an audience invested in the characters as real people rather than just human-shaped enablers of plot.

That and the whole honey thing is pretty fascinating. So thanks, Chuck, for again serving as my human-shaped enabler of factoids. When you’re involved it seems like nothing’s off-topic at all.