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If he didn't think it would be helpful, why did he build it?
 (From Scary Go Round. Click on image to see full-sized image.)
Scary Go Round is in its second week of guest strips, right at a point where Shelley (once again) is in trouble, this time having been abducted by aliens. I understand that artists need breaks from time to time. In fact, I had been urging Pete Abrams (Sluggy Freelance) to take a break after he finished That Which Redeems II, because the storyline he did after it just fell flat on its face. But I just don't enjoy guest strips that much.
I don't know... they always leave me feeling a tad empty inside. It's a bit like a fanfic (of which I've written a dozen or so). Here you are with these great characters and an interesting setting... and someone else starts interpreting it in ways you don't agree with. I don't pretend that my own fanfics are any better than those written by others. While I try my best to be true to the characters and true to the creator's universe, it is still my interpretation.
Sometimes, however, people go a bit too far. I remember when several CRfH fanfics appeared that were so out of character (no matter how well crafted) that Maritza herself was upset by them. It started a bit of a conflict on the forums and also crafted certain rules that Maritza has about fanfics and fanart (no nudity/nipples for fanart and no blatant sex or hard-core R stuff for the fanfics). Naturally people start pushing those boundaries, seeing just how far they can go. Heck, I'm no different, though my stories are probably tame compared to some.
Some cartoonists actually don't like fanfics and don't allow them on their forum boards. These are their characters, their children. They don't like seeing them distorted like a Picasso. And while I'm saddened by this, I can understand it. I write. I'm not sure I'd like my characters twisted into some caricature of what I created, with the only similarity to their origin being their names and descriptions. (And no, not all fanficcers do that. Some are remarkably true to the characters, like I said above. But some don't.)
In a way, a guest comic is the ultimate in fanfiction. Here you are, writing up your own interpretation of the comic, drawing it yourself (or with a friend doing the drawing while you script it), and it is posted on the comic itself. Everyone who reads the comic gets to see your creation, your interpretation. And the cartoonist actually used it!
(Well, there is one point higher - actually writing a script for the comic - but in those cases often the creator exercises editorial control. I know from the time CRfH did a script contest (back in 2001) and I tied with someone else's story for first. Part of the script was edited to be more concise... and likewise a script can be returned with suggestions to alter part of it to get it more in character. I do wonder sometimes if a guest-story is canon or not, like the Sluggy story that Phil Foglio drew (and wrote) up. But I suppose it differs from comic to comic.
Just as with fanfics, guest comics sometimes go too far. You can have the characters acting in ways that aren't true to the originals. You have strange bizarre bits that leave you scratching your head and wondering just what the artist had in mind. And then you have Scary Go Round... which is so bizarre anyway that you're left wondering if this is just your garden-variety insanity or something more.
Still, I could kind of see today's comic as part of the continuity. Especially with the Demotivator 6000... there should be one in every politician's office. And it's definitely something Tim would create.
Robert A. Howard
------------------------- All this, and no visit to Sears to buy furniture?
Welcome to the Extreme Home Makeover of Tangents website! Well, I like to joke of it that way. After asking several people what they thought, I started working on changes to the site. Gone are my giving nromlicious homemade oatmeal cookies to people. The complaint: It's too "websnark"
Likewise I redid the navigation buttons and the background color (the latest change just instituted today), and revised the format to include navigation buttons on the side of the site (and also narrow the amount of text of the reviews).
So, I'm curious as to what my readers think of these changes. Are there any others you'd recommend? What else would you like to see? Feel free to make suggestions in my message board thread on the topic (and you don't even have to worry about a 200 character limit like you get in the tagboard!).
Anyway, take care!
Robert A. Howard
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