Today’s strip inspired by Rob Liefeld.

A problem with being a comic fan is I only buy the trade paperbacks because otherwise they’re pretty damn expensive individually ($8 an issue). And a bigger problem is the second I see the next book in the series on the shelf, I grab it, meaning I have to wait even longer for the next volume than if I had just paced myself, waited a couple of weeks and then picked up the book. That way, instead of waiting six months, I would only have to wait five or whatever.

But I love a series that still has more books to come out. Especially when there are already something like ten books in the series. And then when you catch up, you have to wait months for the next one. But only a good series, like Ultimate Spider-man, Punisher MAX, Fables, Invincible and many others. Man, I can’t wait to have my own series that spans over twenty TPBs or something. It won’t be Gemini Storm, I know that’s only going to be three TPBs at most, but it will be something great.

However, if you’re a fan of a prose novel series, it’s a little harder. With GNs, you can see their progress through the individual issues released every month (Or second month). With prose, individual chapters aren’t released every week or so. You only get whatever updates the author posts on their twitter or blog or whatever, and even then you don’t have a definite release date. Such as George R.R. Martin’s blog and I’ve only been a fan of the series since 2008, so I can’t imagine how you guys who have been waiting since Feast for Crows came out. Thankfully, on the 23rd Sanderson announced Towers of Midnight was finished, final draft and all, ready for a November 2nd release date. And I just know I won’t be able to wait and save ToM for Christmas like I did last year. It’s a hard choice: Hold off buying the book and make the wait for the next one less stressful, but constantly hear the spoilers online and see it in the book stores, taunting me, or buy the damn thing, stay up all night reading it, and then be tormented by the waiting. Yeah, I’m going with option B.

Oh well, in the meantime I can just re-read the books I have now. I’ve always found that a story can be so much better on the second read-through. Well, except for All Star Batman and Robin, that seems to get worse every time I flip through it, which is a shame because I love the art and the story was amusing.

Seeya next week.

~ David

We skipped a strip because I screwed up the punchline. Sorry about that.

Yeah, that’s what she said (About it being bigger, not the brain eating).

So the cock punch strip seems to be quite popular, which is always good. Add that to the way our hits seem to be going up and I’m starting to think it’s time to get out some t-shirts. Would anyone be interested in buying a cock punch t-shirt?

Oh, and Indyplanet is finally back up, so now everyone can go buy a copy of Just Another Day.

That’s all for this week. Hopefully I’ll have something more next time.

~ David

Wonder what she planned to do with that?

The most effective way to tell someone to go and fuck themselves.

Yesterday, we had a federal election to choose the next Australian Prime Minister. Unfortunately, it’s still too close to call, so we may not find out for a while. And really, I don’t feel like getting into Australian politics with this comic (I’ve tried once or twice but Paul tends to ignore a strip if he doesn’t get the joke. And I’m here to entertain, not preach). I stayed up late last night with my family, trying to find out the results, and then got sick of waiting and went to bed even though it’s Sunday. Meh.

That comic I was talking about last week? You can see some of the pages on my deviantArt gallery. Still wondering whether I should colour them and whether I should start a new webcomic for them. I just finished pencilling page 13, all the others are inked, and I have ten pages scanned. But as I look at it, I’m really thinking about just finishing the story, calling it a one-shot and starting all over again on something else.

Oh, I have it: The Wheel of Time.

I was never really a big fantasy reader growing up. My dad tried to get me into Lord of the Rings when I was young, but I could barely get past twenty pages. And then we saw the movies when they came out and the books were ruined for me forever (I can’t read a book if I’ve seen the movie). Then I found Harry Potter and enjoyed it so much I was willing to get through 760 pages of Order of the Phoenix. The fifth book really helped prep me for the door stopper fantasy genre, ongoing scenes, endless description, pointless details, new character after new character who you’ll probably forget about five pages later, etc. It was in 2008 that I checked out A Song of Fire and Ice after seeing so many people say it was good and thoroughly enjoyed it. I checked to see when a Dance of Dragons would come out, found out how overdue it was and that according to George R.R. Martin’s blog, it wasn’t near done, so I went looking for a new series.

Wheel of Time was perfect. Hundreds of pages, going over the thousand number in some books, eleven volumes so far and a prequel novel, plus the books were coming out a couple of years apart, plus a lot of recommendations from people who had similar tastes to me. I dove right in, not knowing Robert Jordan had died until The Shadow Rising. Thankfully we had Brandon Sanderson to fill in, so i wasn’t worried (I was afraid Sanderson might ruin the series, but I’ll talk about that later).

Right away I found the books to drag on. The Great Hunt, while enjoyable, felt like it took me half a year to get through. And this is back when I only read books on the train, not at home, so I got through about fifty pages a day roughly, but only rode it three or four days a week, so it did take me about a month to get through each book. The first five books I loved, especially Fires of Heaven since it wrapped up a lot of the plots that I thought would drag out. And then came Lord of Chaos, which set the stage for the next five books. These took even longer, even though I skipped whole paragraphs and pages that were nothing more than descriptions of dresses and expressions and arms being folded under breasts and all the rest. I went weeks and months before buying the next book at times, tending to pick up some Stephen King or Neil Gaiman book. Crossroads of Twilight I heard so much negativity I put it off for a while before finally getting it and groaning as I found everyone proven right. Thankfully, Knife of Dreams managed to bring me back some hope. Plots were actually being solved, Mat and Tylin were married, Perrin had finally rescued Faile, Elayne was pretty much on the throne of Andor.

A month after I finished Knife of Dreams, The Gathering Storm came out. I had heard that Sanderson had spread it out to three books even though there was only supposed to be one and was wondering if things were going to get better or worse. The series was finally becoming interesting again, I didn’t want it spoilt. But it was a couple of weeks before Christmas, so I told my parents to get it for me. Then the reviews came in and everyone was praising Sanderson’s work. I read a couple of spoilers, flicked through the last couple of pages in the book stores and eagerly awaited Christmas morning. By New Year’s Eve I had the entire thing read. Sanderson had managed to suck me in and I couldn’t stop reading, something Jordan had been unable to do. Everyone started talking to each other, the women weren’t as hate-worthy and so much happened I couldn’t believe that there needed to be three books.

I’ve added Brandon Sanderson to my twitter feed, smiling as he posts updates on Towers of Midnight, which is getting through with its editing process, and eagerly await its release. I have the entire Mistborn trilogy and enjoyed that too. Currently, I’m re-reading the old Wheel of Time books and finding them so much more enjoyable, noticing things I missed, being reintroduced to the characters I’ve grown fond of and growing more anxious for the release of book 13.

I’ll be sad to see it go, but all good things must come to an end. Hmm, but what to read when it’s done? I’ve heard some good things about The Sword of Truth. Or maybe I should write my own. Yeah, add it to the other twenty-five hundred things I have going.

~ David

I sincerely apologise for the lateness. But I hope you enjoyed this look into the lives of our heroes.

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And so the day is almost at an end. I got nothing, sorry.