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"Trade paperback".
Queen of Good Things, Honest
In print comics, the Trade Paperback or TPB is a collection of comics, usually comprising one or two storyarcs.
The advent of the TPB has resulted in the rise of decompressed storytelling, wherein a writer uses 5 or 6 issues to tell a story rather than the done-in-ones of old. Complaints about Shive's slow pacing always remind me of similar complaints towards comic writers who focus more on how the comic will look in the TPB rather than the individual issue.
My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.
Writer, Artist, Ignored
... I had a pet tortoise once. (No, that's apropos of very little.)
, Aah, I see—thank you both. ^_^
You know, it just occurred to me that I don't think that I've read El Goonish Shive via the archives—beyond occasional re-readings of a page or two at a shot—in a long time; I generally just read that day's page and move on, as far as I recall.
It's not even the comic that I'd rank the lowest at the moment on my reading list (that would perhaps be either Amya or Out Of My Element)—in fact, I think that it has actually crept up a little during this arc.
edited 19th Sep '14 8:34:41 PM by ArsThaumaturgis
My Games & Writing
My Nan has a tortoise and he can move quite fast when he wants to.
Someone on Tumblr noticed that Fantasy!Justin doesn't have his earring, because Luke hasn't noticed it yet.
Queen of Good Things, Honest
Always remember the moral of the tortoise and the hare.
Slow and steady may win the race, but if your opponent stopped to take a nap in the middle of it, the competition probably only mattered to you anyway.
edited 20th Sep '14 6:17:51 AM by TobiasDrake
My Tumblr. Currently liveblogging Haruhi Suzumiya and revisiting Danganronpa V3.
Heh, as I recall I did notice that—once the scene had been revealed as fantasy. ^^;
Never Trust
I thought the moral was "Always be sure to drug you opponent's food".
"Complete incompetence loses the race."
Always make sure you have a partner hide at the end so that you drive your opponent have a heart attack kill them as they continue trying to outrace you.
"it couldn't include Tom Bombadil, could it" No. No it could not. Cutting out Tom Bombadil was the best thing Peter Jackson did. Holy hell did the Bombadil chapters ever drag on.
I'm fine with the slowness of EGS, and the wasted panels, and all that. I don't feel any particular rush with it. I enjoy each day's strip, and then I move on.
X-Men X-Pert, my blog where I talk about X-Men comics.
Nine thousand nine hundred eighty-two reasons.
I don't know, I really liked Tom Bombadil.
Pacing of this strip doesn't bother me, either.
Mostly does better things now. Key word mostly. Writes things, but you'll never find them. Or you can ask.
Regarding Tom Bombadil, as indicated, I rather enjoyed of his section of the story. Now, the beginning—from the first page up to the escape from the Shire—I found to drag on rather badly, as I recall.
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Luke didn't notice the earring
Really, that's all to say about today's strip, I guess. *sigh* Alright, so things are a little slow...
Writer, Artist, Ignored
I forgot that Nanase really liked being really tall back at the party.
My only comment for the main strip is that there needs to be a new gay code because this one clearly isn't working. And I feel really sorry for them both.
As for the sketch, I get the feeling Justin would be more chief of security. Though you could still have the commander rank but I think he'd be wearing operations yellow. Yeah, you can totally be a commander and be in operations colours because commander Data. Or was he a lutenient-commander, I don't recall...
edited 22nd Sep '14 4:12:29 AM by MousaThe14
The Blog The Art
Think of the mooks!
I think a meta version of Nanase would grab Shive by shoulders and say "What is your obsession with the height 5'4"? I want to be taller, damn it!"
Actually, that does lead me to wonder a bit about magic. It's all-but-accepted as true that magic affects the physical body when awakened - it's the reason why Susan no longer needs to dye her hair, why she's grown three inches, and why Nanase believes her bust is impressive. It may also be affecting the base physiques of Elliot and Ellen, although that's not clear for sure yet.
However, while the spells gained are reflective, in some ways, of the user, it seems like the physical changes are not. To take the most obvious examples, both Susan and Nanase regarding height. Susan was completely satisfied with being 5'6". Nanase is annoyed that she's only 5'4" (EDIT: And she's been wanting to be taller for a while). However, Susan grew three inches, while Nanase is stuck wearing platform boots. The logical conclusion is that personal desire may basically guide what spells are acquired, but some other factor determines physical changes arising from awakening.
(Alternately, there is one other conclusion one could reach - that Nanase would be even shorter - maybe even under 5 feet tall - if she hadn't awakened. However, outside of Word of God, we have no way of knowing. There is circumstantial evidence to support this - of the four blood relatives shown for Nanase, one was only shown sitting, one is pre-adolescent and the other two, her mother and Tedd, aren't tall either.)
Oh, main comic... Chekhov's Gun has been fired, change blindness is in effect, Justin's neck is probably starting to hurt from leaning that much.
edited 22nd Sep '14 8:27:51 AM by 32_Footsteps
Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Hah, another good page! ^_^
Poor, poor Justin and Luke. XD;
Building on the thought of magic reflecting its owner, perhaps just as one's spells reflect the actions of their owner, the physical changes related are an inverted reflection: one gets changes that one doesn't care about.
Think of the mooks!
I'm not complaining at all about today's page, but it doesn't quite rise to the level of "good" for EGS Maybe "good for this storyline" (if I wanted to levy criticism about this storyline more), but I know Shive can do better than this. At his best, Shive can deliver today's punchline with other jokes or with serious plot advancement.
I don't know; maybe there's other things going on and Shive's too distracted to deliver his best work. Still, today's comic is okay. But I really think Shive's more capable than "okay."
edited 22nd Sep '14 11:55:48 AM by 32_Footsteps
Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
Hmm... Okay, I do believe that I agree with you that this isn't the best page that Shive has produced; but it got a laugh from me, as I recall, which I'm inclined to call decent at least.
While he may just be procrastinating, he's not wrong. It WOULD be super inappropriate to ask him out during the tournament. And that's aside from the fact that it'd set a bad precedent re the "no hitting on your opponents" rule, since it'd basically reinforce the idea that card game tournaments are a place for nerd hookups.
As for the sketchbook, I have to wonder if Dan has seen Iron Man, given that it answers the question of "how do you put on powered armour?" on at least two occasions.
... It... it couldn't include Tom Bombadil, could it...? T-T
(In all seriousness, I do understand why they removed him, I think, but I still kinda miss him: he was a part of the book-version that I rather liked—very much including the incident with the (rather cool—sort-of pun intended) barrow wight.)
\*ahem* But I'll stop there before I start rambling on about hyena-wargs and how cool it would have been to have seen- er, yes, stopping now. ^^;
TPBarchive.edited 19th Sep '14 4:56:47 PM by ArsThaumaturgis
My Games & Writing