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1

Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 31: Discussion

« on: February 08, 2012, 01:05:14 pm »

While I'm not taking back my opinion that the build-up and revelation of Maytag's 'split personality' were badly written and numbingly paced (even taking into account the presence/absence of the bonus chapter), I will say that I....genuinely loved the conversation between Maytag and Crest.  (See guys, I don't indiscriminately hate everything Brion produces.)  I did not anticipate reading the most emotive kind of scene - the kind where nobody is 'in the right' exactly but you sympathise with both of them anyway - but here we are.

What I'm seeing in Maytag here - rather, what I'm hoping I'm seeing - is someone almost Dexter Morgan-like.   Not a perfect comparison, but by that I mean an extremely high-functioning sociopath.  Someone with enough empathy to know exactly what people like to see but not quite enough to realise that those people will feel betrayed and frustrated when they realise that whatever her 'real' self might have been, it's become suppressed under layers of chameleonic assumed traits.  After all, she's just been giving them what they want, right?  The fourth panel right here hit me like a punch in the gut.  If this is honestly the thesis statement for her entire life then I've found a reservoir of sympathy for this character I thought had completely dried up.

She doesn't understand people thoroughly enough to 'get' that what close friends really want is to know the 'real her', distinct from the show she puts on for everyone else - but variations on that show are all she has to offer.  And she seems not to understand why Crest, Regina et al wouldn't see that as being enough.

If this is what Maytag is, if this is who she is, then I feel comfortable saying you've won back a reader - as in, someone who's reading out of genuine interest rather than morbid curiosity and nostalgic fondness for Book Zero.  I'm just hoping this gets played to the fore.

Also, I'm enjoying Suspiria's 'ill person' hair although her follicular magic does emphasise the fact that if you shaved and washed most of the female cast you wouldn't be able to tell them apart.

(However, since I can't make a completely uncritical post, one small complaint is from this page, sixth panel.  'Why are you pretending to have tears now'?  Nobody talks like this.  'Why are you pretending to cry?' or 'Why are you crying? I know it's an act' - fine, but 'to have tears' sounds like a phrase from someone whose first language isn't English.  Distractingly stilted.  Try reading your dialogue out loud, or better yet, get someone to act it out with you.)

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 31: Discussion

« on: December 16, 2011, 04:43:54 pm »

You need to at least see a few scenes of her up there, get a sense of how the show went, what she talked about, and how it ended in order for the narrative to make sense.

Not nearly as much as there was.  I know you aim for 'print comic' pacing but even reading the whole lot in one go, it dragged.

What would have been more effective is to have a much quicker run-up from this page to the end of the chapter - most of Maytag's explanation as to why she has two personalities could have been cut while losing nothing, because it's explained in the side story and then reiterated at the beginning of the next chapter.  We don't need to be told something three times; that ten pages could have been five.  Remember, she's fighting to keep the audience at this stage.  They don't know her, they have no reason to like her or sympathise with her, and by this point she's not even standing there naked any more.  The best way to keep them on side is by initially supplying as little information as possible, so it's not 'So I pretend to have two different personalities because I want to be liked - want to know how that happened?', it's 'So I pretend to have two different personalities - want to know why?'

Then after the first three panels of the next chapter, Maytag wraps up with a completely ludicrous punchline - it doesn't matter what it is - and there's a reaction shot of the audience utterly wetting themselves with laughter (as opposed to sound effects).  Then she can make a joke of the fact that nothing she's talked is inherently funny - maybe a deadpan 'I guess my scarring childhood trauma is pretty hilarious after all, it must be my delivery' (which also serves as a meta-joke for the reader, if you're into that sort of thing, since of course we don't know anything about her delivery).  Then chop the next two pages into one - show's over now, she shouldn't want to overstay her welcome after a challenging routine but she definitely is - and then we're where we are now.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 31: Discussion

« on: December 16, 2011, 02:35:18 pm »

Which is why I decided that the best thing to do with her act is to "cheat"... you'll see what I mean by "cheat" in a couple of pages, if you can't already guess.

If today's page is what you were referring to, it....didn't work.  One of the golden rules of writing is 'show, don't tell' but in an instance like this - where you're writing about a comedy performer but admit you yourself cannot write comedy - the rule is really more 'show or tell'.  In this case, if literally all we knew about this performance was Bob's feedback then fine, we all have an imagination, we can fill in the blanks.  But after I've read some of Maytag's monologue - with samples ranging from the unfunny to the downright tragic - I simply can't suspend my disbelief that far.  I can't think 'oh, well if this guy says it was funny then I guess it was?'  It's kind of an insult to the reader's intelligence to expect them to accept a character's word, particularly the word of a new character they don't know yet, when there's already evidence to the contrary.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 31: Discussion

« on: December 10, 2011, 09:07:02 am »

Though my opinions about Maytag and her performance have not changed after the side story, we're less than 1 page into the next chapter, I don't think we need to start it with some hatin' guys.

Legitimate criticism and 'hating' are not the same.  And I agree it seems unlikely that an audience almost entirely comprised of strangers who came to be entertained would then sit and listen to an hour of a girl talking about her mental health problems.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 30: Discussion

« on: October 28, 2011, 02:15:54 pm »

I'll just say this... in the next chapter, you'll quickly see that this statement is very wrong.

Well, up to this point it's been entirely correct, but I really do hope things change.  I've been waiting for over a year to see Maytag actually face the consequences of her shortcomings and maybe even grow as a character.  You've been really kind of reluctant to let that happen so far and the comic has been suffering for it; the rest of the cast can only make up for so much.

And you don't consider playing friends for fools a flaw? If she's pretending to have two personalities, then who's the real Maytag? It's like she's become a complete stranger again and how well do you think that will go with Crest, Susperia and others? That she couldn't trust them enough to be honest with them?

It's only a true character flaw if she's facing real, quantifiable consequences for it.  If that's coming soon then I welcome it, but up until now?  There has never been a point in Book One where her negative traits and the consequences of having those traits have been fully explored.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Chapter 30: Discussion

« on: October 28, 2011, 05:55:41 am »

Okay.

Now this has happened, the only way this comic will be salvageable is if this scene ends with May excusing herself to somewhere private after the show's over and immediately start freaking out through sheer panic - revealing that it was Shy!May all along and it took every last ounce of her fortitude to not fall apart on stage and refuse to give her saboteurs the satisfaction of victory.  I would love to see that.

What makes me think that this isn't a fake-out is...well, I did kinda call this eighteen months ago.  Maytag's 'shy' personality and 'jester' personality have been growing more and more similar almost since the beginning of Book One.  We've already seen her perfectly able to assume Jester May's personality without the suit.  Remember this scene with Fata Morgana?  That was 2009.

My problem - besides everything Shazam mentioned - is that if this isn't a fake-out, if May really has been pretending to have two personalities, then that is it for her as a character.  No weaknesses, no vulnerabilities, no flaws - nothing that she ever actually pays for, that gets in her way or affects her relationship with other characters for the worse.  She was already careering towards Mary Sue territory as it is but this is ridiculous.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: The Criticism Thread

« on: January 17, 2011, 04:05:22 pm »

When I have the time and strength for an essay, it'll be about Bern and May's relationship.  But this stuck out to me:

Although all characters e.g. Maytag, Bern have stength's and weaknesses, Crest, although seemingly awesome, has no real strengths.
He is nervous around women, cant use a sword, and is generally a coward.

Not to mention he's STILL a virgin.

Apart from a verbal punching bag, what use does crest have?
Seriously.

Putting to one side the (bizarre) idea that virginity is a character flaw and needs to be 'fixed', I'm going to have to call you on him being a coward.

The first time we meet Crest, he asks Maytag out despite knowing as a near-certainty she's out of his league and will turn him down.  As small a thing as this is?  Not cowardly.  Then we find him cheating at poker in a gang of thugs he can't not know will kill him if they catch him at it - not for personal gain, but to restore his mother's sight, and that against the wishes of a powerful father figure.  He tries to defend Maytag against said gang of thugs - and later, Voulger - despite not having any strategy or special skills.  He doesn't cower, he literally stands up to them in the near-certainty that he's going to die for it.  Stupid?  Certainly, but very brave.  And this in the first two chapters.  Since then, he's lost the limelight to Suspiria and other new characters but there's never really a point at which he gives into cowardice.

Does Crest have any magic powers?  No.  Is he especially good with a sword?  No.  Is he in any way remarkable?  No.  Does he recognise his limits?  Absolutely.  But in the context of the comic, these ARE his strengths: he's a straight man (no pun intended) to Flipside's more outlandish, preternaturally capable protagonists.  He's there as a constant reminder of what the baseline for 'average' is in this world, he acts as a lens through which the audience can perceive the main characters, and he's the one who can maintain a sense of perspective and common sense re. the seriousness of what's going on. 

In Book Zero, Regina served much the same purpose: she was a sorceress, yeah, but only just.   Her dramatic function was to be normal - someone who was trying her best despite her flaws and very rarely succeeding - because stories with extraordinary characters need ordinariness too.  Her - and Crest's - conflicts and struggles were all the more powerful because they're played out on the same field as Maytag et al despite not being as competent or confident.

(And while I'm here, the awkward, borderline slowmo-train-wreck nature of Regina's relationship with Lucient represented some of the best writing in Book Zero and indeed in the comic to date.  It worked, and I felt genuinely gutted for her, because it felt real.  Throwing your heart and soul into the idea of a relationship with someone and then having it just barely not suck enough for you to immediately back out?  Very nicely done.  Just saying.)

This is practically a pre-emptive criticism, or at least a piece of advice: Crest does not need to be any more badass than he is now.  The slow improvement in his swordfighting is nice, the fact he has potential is good, but the last thing we need is for him to ever reach Bernadette levels of competence.  I said my piece on Maytag degrading as a character a long time ago, but as for Crest, he needs to be what he is right now: an awkward, slightly helpless everyman.  He holds the cast together.

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Flipside Discussion / Re: Maytag's characterisation over Book 1

« on: April 25, 2010, 11:41:24 am »

Thanks, Churba.

I understand that of course people change and develop as they grow, and comics suffer if their characters don't develop at all, but a naturally changing personality isn't what I'm seeing here.  If the change in her behaviour had come about over two or ten years then I'd have much less to criticise.  My problem here is twofold: firstly, Maytag's personality has changed very rapidly and none of the people close to her seem to have noticed.  Secondly, for the comic to be interesting it really needs Maytag to have two very distinct identities, and they keep getting more similar.   

One of the big rules of storytelling is that character should dictate plot, i.e. 'in this situation, Maytag would act in such-and-such a way, so the plot unfolds like this'.  What I'm seeing currently is a plot that dictates character - 'for me to get the story from A to B, Maytag should be acting like this, so she will be'.

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Flipside Discussion / Maytag's characterisation over Book 1

« on: April 25, 2010, 08:38:39 am »

Long time reader, used to be on the old forum under another name.  Hello!

Well.  I've ended up writing an essay about Maytag's characterisation, but I suppose I need to preface it with a question: Brion, have you deliberately been writing Maytag as if her two personalities are merging - or, more accurately, as if her normal identity is being swallowed up by her jester identity?  Because normal May and jester May have been almost indistinguishable for a good few chapters now, and in losing that duality she's being stripped of the only thing that makes her readable. 

Alone, jester May is a hypercompetent one-dimensional figure with, in my opinion, few character traits that would garner the sympathy of the reader.  That she is also a shy, submissive young woman is what tempers her character and makes it stronger.

'Flipside' is the name of the comic.  Maytag's split personality is the unique selling point, and there is so much more you could be doing with this concept.  If you haven't meant to make the two Maytags more similar, you need to appreciate that making normal Maytag more like jester Maytag is making her a weaker character overall - this scene is the worst offender but there are others I could specify.  There is a brilliant scene in Book Zero where May has to run away from an injured Moss and don the jester suit before she can even talk to him.  What about the other way around?  What situations are there that normal May could deal with but jester May can't? 

There's nothing wrong with wanting them both to be strong characters but simply making them the same defeats the point.  They need to complement each other, and you may need to reconsider how strengths and weaknesses are divided between the two of them.  At the moment, her jester personality is so unassailable that it's hard not to wonder why she ever takes the costume off. 

Jester May is fun to be around and you'd definitely want her on your side in a fight, but on the other hand she's (according solely to her Notebook entry) lazy, crass, selfish and reckless.  Why not play up those weaknesses more?  Why not put her in situations where her overkill approach to conflict resolution gets people hurt on her side, or where she loses friends because she's too impatient and refuses to put other people first?  She's written as if you're afraid of having her show any major flaws and suffer the consequences. 

As just one suggestion, you could easily rearrange their characters in such a way that jester May becomes the go-to girl for physical conflict and normal May becomes a source of strength for emotional or interpersonal conflict.  The intelligence that's realised as smooth-talking and strategising in jester May could be realised as wisdom and empathy in her other personality.  If jester May's expertise at dealing with people is revealed as being more superficial, based on cold reading and experience rather than real understanding, immediately she has a weakness that makes her less invincible.  She could be cheated, hurt and betrayed by people who can act better than she can read them.  And then, naturally, normal May has an enormous character strength that she was lacking before.

So that's almost my two cents.  If you have been intentionally writing Maytag's two personalities as merging, then there are some potentially interesting character arcs that might spring from that, but what makes me suspect that this wasn't intentional is that none of the characters have noticed.  Normal May went from being completely horrified by Voulger stripping her naked (and obviously grateful when Bern covered her up afterwards) to being cheerful accepting of Glyph using his magic X-ray glasses on her in Chapter 20.  She even went on to lecture Bern about modesty during the bathtub scene in Bed & Breakfast.  I know the contexts are different, but for her sense of modesty to do a complete 180 over an in-universe timeline of - maybe a few weeks?  Why has this happened, and more to the point, why hasn't Bern noticed?  Heck, why hasn't Crest noticed?

Honestly, at the moment it seems like you've created a potentially fascinating character, gotten bored or frustrated with the limitations her split personality places on you, and decided to simply ignore them just so the plot can progress.   I would really like to be proven wrong but in the meantime, I think you need to pay attention to how she's being written.  She's getting more 'generic badass' by the day and it's a huge turn-off.