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.

POV

Posted on August 22, 2012 by Clint

Came across one of my old college textbooks the other day. Seeing as I went to college in the early 90s, I can’t even really remember which class it was for, but it had an interesting guide to elements of fiction, with an eye towards analyzing and critiquing written stories.

One of the elements it talked about was the issue of “point of view”. All stories need to make a decision about how they’re told, and in pure prose this decision is one of the more important ones because of the scale of intimacy and information provided. You may have heard terms before such as “first person” or “third person”, but did you know that the third person viewpoint can be subdivided further into a “limited” or “omniscient” style? Or have you heard of the “dramatic” viewpoint?

Well, let me back up in case you were confused at the beginning. The point of view is probably defined most simply as the identity of the narrator of your tale. For example purposes I could take the first line of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series: “The man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed.”

This is a third-person viewpoint, possibly even a dramatic one. In a couple of other choices, I might get the following…

First-person: That damned man in black fled across the desert, and I followed him.

Third-person omniscient: The traitorous Walter, the man in black, fled across the desert, and the honorable Roland Deschain, gunslinger, followed him.

You could also switch the first-person viewpoint and get “I fled across the desert, and that stubborn gunslinger followed me.”

These simple changes become pretty fundamental when you think about them. First-person viewpoints are the most obvious in terms of coloring everything experienced, because it’s through the filter of a single character, an “I” which not only has imperfect access to information about the world and other characters, but may also be very, very biased.

Third-person limited takes a step back and tends to still present information through the focus of a single character, having access to their inner thoughts as needed, but has a little more leeway in relating events; including the option to actually jump the focus around, something that can’t really happen with first person unless you want the reader to be thoroughly confused. In A Song of Ice and Fire George R. R. Martin uses third-person limited, first following one of his protagonists, and then another. In this chapter you might be treated to Tyrion’s thoughts and fears over a certain event, while in the next it might be the same event retold from another character’s perspective. It’s a very flexible option, allowing for a balance of bias and detatchment.

Third-person omniscient just basically plays God. The narrator sees all and knows all, although there’s a paradox in that sometimes this viewpoint is the most biased of all. “The traitorous Walter, the man in black, fled across the desert, and the honorable Roland Deschain, gunslinger, followed him.” Judgments are being communicated to the audience right from the start, all the more powerful for the fact that there’s a “voice of God” delivering them. “In this week’s episode, the courageous He-Man must rescue the beautiful princess from the evil Skeletor!” In cases like these the audience really isn’t given any chance to decide for themselves, the story does it for them. Tolkien certainly never seemed interested in showing us Saruman’s point of view, so much as condemning him, both through Gandalf and the Universe. Omniscient stories might arguably be the only ones where unfettered Good and Evil can exist–although it could be only because the author tells us so.

Now if you’re paying attention you might have noticed that I skipped over the idea of second-person. There’s a reason for that, and that reason is because it is almost non-existent in narrative fiction.

“You fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.”

That’s the second-person viewpoint, and it’s a mighty awkward choice for telling stories… with one exception: Interactive Fiction. The Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books, or the Infocom games of yore, are shining examples of where second-person works to draw the reader into the story as an active participant. The storyteller in this case isn’t talking about someone else (or even “themselves”), they’re interested in you, and what you will do next.

Finally there’s the dramatic viewpoint, which is the one Zombie Ranch uses most. It’s the idea of having no narrator at all, of just capturing events as they unfold and leaving the audience to form their own opinions and judgments. No telepathic insights, no universal adjectives or inner monologues. Actions and words, presented with minimal commentary. Hemingway was said to be a master of this, and so perhaps I really ought to brush up on my Hemingway.

For now, I hope this entry wasn’t too rambling. I’m still trying to get over a nasty cold and I have an unfortunate feeling my coherency is not the better for it. But that might just be my point of view.